The Kids are All Right
by EGB Fan
Summary: A glimpse into the future, focusing on the children of the Extreme Ghostbusters.
1. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer: **_Ghostbusters _and _Extreme Ghostbusters_ © Dan Ayrkroyd, Harold Ramis and Fil Barlow. Eden Spengler and Marie Lupin, mentioned in the second chapter, © Fritz Baugh. All other characters are creations of the author.

**A/N:** These short stories are set in 2020, 2022 and 2025. They feature mostly the author's original characters, with canon characters playing a secondary role. If you don't want to read a story like that, you are advised to stop here.

.-.-.-.

**Max**

On the night of his sixteenth birthday, Max Miller had a big party attended by all of his friends and closest family. Then the very next morning, he received a letter that began, _'I am your mother.' _He took the letter into the bathroom, locked the door and read what this woman had to say. Then he just stood there. He forgot all about life outside the bathroom until someone tapped on the door and his mother's voice - for she _was_ his mother - said, "Max, are you okay in there?"

Max didn't know how to answer. He didn't even think of "I'm fine," until many hours later. She called again: "Max?" She was already beginning to sound worried, and Max knew he would have to do something to appease her. Still not saying anything, he went and pushed the letter under the door. He heard it being picked up, and then her footsteps as she moved away.

Relieved to have got rid of her, Max put down the lid of the toilet seat and sat down to think. He would have liked some quiet, but before very long both of his parents were outside the door saying urgently, "Max? Max?"

It was difficult to know what to say. He couldn't very well answer them when they hadn't actually _asked_ him anything. Then his mother's voice said, "Honey, come out and we'll talk about this."

"No thanks, Mom," said Max. "I'm okay in here."

That seemed to shut them up for a moment. Then he heard hushed voices, his father occasionally speaking a little too loudly, if he didn't want to be overheard. Max caught, "How the hell did she find him?" and, "Is she _allowed_ to do this?"

He thought they might start talking to him again, but thankfully they decided to leave him alone. Max had hoped they would, knowing that it was a distinct possibility. They knew he thought nothing of spending hours in the bathroom if he was feeling confused, and if either of _them_ needed to use the bathroom, they had another one in their nice big ground-floor apartment - it was practically a house. Max knew that, in stark contrast, his biological mother had spent several years of her life squatting in a rundown apartment. He wondered if she was hard-up for bathrooms nowadays.

Time passed. A long time, probably, because his parents grew sufficiently worried to call in reinforcements. Max was jolted out of his trance by a series of extremely loud knocks, followed by a very familiar voice: "Max, it's me, open up!"

He had never disobeyed that voice in his life. Max opened the door and found on the other side the anxious face of his oldest and dearest friend, Rose Rivera. He beckoned her inside. She went, and he shut the door, though he didn't lock it. She'd hate that.

"Hi, Rose," he said. "Did you have a good time at the party?"

"Yes," Rose said dismissively. "Max, you don't have to see her if you don't want to."

"Who?"

"Your… that Jackie woman."

"I know," said Max.

"Why did you lock yourself in the bathroom?"

"Felt like it."

"Oh," said Rose. "Do you… feel like coming out again now?"

"Not really," said Max, and he took his seat on the toilet lid once again. "Do you have anything planned for tonight? I really feel like seeing a movie."

Rose continued to look worried, and he wished she wouldn't. She didn't speak for a moment, but then she said, "All right, I'll go to a movie with you, if you like." Then she sat down on the bathroom floor, and started asking him what he wanted to see. They had a long conversation. They talked about movies, music, people from school, their parents, music again… and then suddenly Max said, "I want to see her."

"Oh!" Rose looked startled. "Right, well… I guess we'd better write back to her."

"We?" said Max.

"Well, I'll help if you want me to."

Max smiled widely at her. "Thanks, Rose, that's really nice of you."

"Shall we get out of this bathroom now?" asked Rose.

"Oh," said Max, "I don't know."

"Why? What's the problem?"

"Well… I can't tell Mom and Dad that I want to meet her."

"Oh Max, I'm sure they'll understand," Rose said gently.

"They'll be hurt."

"They won't."

"They will."

Rose got to her feet, asking, "Would you like _me_ to tell them?"

"No, no, I'll do it," said Max, also standing.

"Would you like me to leave?"

"No, stay. I've missed my run."

"It won't hurt for one day," said Rose.

"I wish I'd remembered," said Max.

He normally went out running with Hawks, the family's pet dog, some mornings and every afternoon. The dog might have been shut away somewhere now that Rose had arrived. When she was little she'd had to be kept separate from the Millers' first dog, Knicks, because she was terrified of him. She had learnt to put up with him after a few years, but since then Knicks had died, Hawks had been taken in and he'd grown almost twice the size of Rose. She didn't mind being in the same room with him when he wasn't being too energetic, but when he _was_ feeling playful, that wasn't good. Being so big, Hawks needed a lot of exercise. Max wondered if he'd been walked at all that day.

Rose took Max's hand and began to lead him out of the bathroom, saying, "Never mind."

Garrett and Jo, Max's parents, were in the living room - she on the sofa, he sitting opposite her in his wheelchair, their heads almost touching. Max approached them, and they both looked up expectantly. He didn't know how long he just stared at them until someone or something - presumably Rose - nudged him in the small of his back.

"Iwannaseer," Max said quickly, as though he was a talking doll and Rose's nudge had triggered his mechanism.

"You want to _see_ her?" asked Garrett, perhaps just for clarity.

Max nodded slowly.

"Well I'm not surprised," Garrett said. "Do you want _us_ to do anything?"

"I, I, I don't know," said Max.

"Let's answer that letter," Rose said briskly. "You can arrange when to meet, and then decide nearer the time whether you want any of us to, to do anything."

"O-okay," said Max. He looked then at Jo, who was staring blankly into space. "Mom?"

She blinked a few times, focused on his face and, at last, smiled. "Yeah, honey?"

"I love you."

He stooped, hugged her tightly and kissed the top of her head. Then he and Rose started composing a response to that letter.

.-.-.-.

Her name was Jackie Wells. It was horribly confusing to Max, because he knew that his name used to be Sanford, and he'd always been told that his birth parents were John and Jackie Sanford. They were drug addicts who let their unwanted baby crawl amongst their used needles. Max had never been told _that_ exactly, but it was what he imagined. At times he thought he remembered both of them, but on reflection he hadn't been able to visualise them before seeing _Trainspotting_, so it seemed likely that all of his memories of his old life were, in actual fact, memories of that movie.

When he saw her, sitting on the park bench where they had arranged to meet, she didn't look anything like he imagined he remembered her. She didn't look like _him _either. She looked like a bottle blonde in her sixties, although he knew that in reality she wasn't yet forty. She'd had a tough life all right, and Max almost felt guilty for the body he had brought with him. It was like she'd turned up in a rusty second-hand Ford and he in a brand new state-of-the-art Mercedes.

Hawks was with him, panting excitedly, almost certainly hoping for a nice long run. He was going to be disappointed. Max led the dog over to the woman on the bench, and ventured timidly, "Jackie?"

He needn't have asked. It had to be her. No one else in the vicinity looked like a drug addict who had gone cold turkey (well, she _said_ she had). The woman looked up, stared, got to her feet and seemed surprised that she _still_ wasn't as tall as he was. It must have been a shock to her. The last time she had seen him, he was barely two years old.

"Wow," she said. As she looked him up and down, Max noticed that she had blue eyes like his. That was _something_. "You grew up real good. You work out or something?"

"Er, yeah."

"I heard you got adopted by a couple of health freaks."

"Can we sit down?" asked Max, beginning to feel a little unsteady.

"Sure, sure."

Jackie sat on the bench, and Max mimicked the action. She took no notice of Hawks until he started sniffing her and slobbering all over the knees of her sweat pants. At this she gave him a filthy look, and Max pulled the dog away to his other side.

"Hawks, sit," said Max. But Hawks remained standing, looking at this strange woman over Max's jeans and breathing heavily at her.

Jackie started rummaging around in her shoulder bag, and asked, "Mind if I smoke?"

Max flinched. "Must you?"

She looked at him for a moment, scowled, and then zipped up the bag.

"I spent years looking for you," she said. "I never _wanted_ to give you up. I never gave anybody permission to have you adopted."

"Well that doesn't matter now," said Max.

"You don't bear a grudge," remarked Jackie.

"I don't remember anything about you."

"Yeah, well, you were… _how_ old?"

"Two."

"Really?" said Jackie. "We had you that long?"

"You should quit smoking," said Max. He was scratching Hawks' ears the whole time they talked. "It makes your lungs all full of tar."

Jackie let out a dry laugh - almost a cackle - and said, "My insides can't get much more fucked up than they are already, kiddo."

"Yes they can."

"I quit all that other stuff, kid. But tobacco's legal - you gotta at least let me have that."

"Can't you call me by my name?"

"Yeah?" said Jackie. "You're still Max, then."

"Yes." Like she didn't know. She'd had a signed letter from him.

"Your father decided to call you that. God knows why."

His father. It was a very remote concept. Max felt absolutely nothing, sitting there talking to this woman. It was hard to believe she had actually given birth to him, and the man who had got her pregnant in the first place… he was a million miles away.

"Why did you decide to track me down?" asked Max.

Jackie stared at him for a few moments. Then she said, "Because you're mine. I never said they could take you."

"They're really great," said Max, suddenly jumping back several sentences and, by the look of her, disconcerting Jackie. "They're not freaks - they just look after their bodies. Aren't you glad I ended up with someone who taught me to look after my health?"

Jackie snorted. "It's better than drugs, I guess."

"Yeah, it is."

"I got on a rocky road. It happens."

"Are you still together?"

"Jesus, Max, can't you follow a conversation?" she asked incredulously. "Are you talking about me and your father now?"

"Yes."

"I haven't seen him for years - I've no idea where he is. Still using, as far as I know."

"Don't you want to know how I am?"

"Well," said Jackie, "you seem all right. Physically, at least."

"I'm happy," said Max.

"Lucky you."

"You said in your letter you wanted to know how I was."

"So I did." Jackie sucked in a long breath, and then asked, "How's school?"

"I'm a C student. When I can concentrate."

"Got a girl?"

"I've been out with this girl Nina a couple times. I don't know, though."

"Dump her if you don't like her," said Jackie. "You can have your pick, body like that."

"So what was he like?"

"Oh, for - who?"

"John," said Max. "My father."

"Oh. I don't really remember."

"But you were together for years."

"We were on smack that whole time."

"What about when you were pregnant?"

Jackie said nothing, and it was like a slap in the face to Max. It had never occurred to him before, but now it was obvious. Why assume anything else? He felt sick. He couldn't help looking down at his body, as though he might have a few fingers or even a whole arm missing, and hadn't noticed before. But thankfully, miraculously, he had come out of this woman's body unscathed.

"John was a complete dick," said Jackie. "Look, don't worry about him. He might not even really _be_ your father."

"Oh!" said Max, and he stopped scratching Hawks' ears in his surprise.

"Don't look like that. Does it really matter now?"

"Who else?"

"Oh God." Jackie sighed heavily. "It's _probably_ John."

"Or…?"

"A couple of dealers."

"A couple? So there were two - are you sure?"

"I don't know, Max, I was drugged up to the eyeballs that entire decade."

"Don't I _look_ like any of them?" Max asked urgently. "Come on, look at me."

"Kid, why do you _care_? You've been calling some other guy Dad for, for…"

"Fourteen years."

"Holy shit," said Jackie. "I really _did_ flush my life down the toilet, didn't I?"

"Yeah," said Max, just as Hawks made a little noise and dropped his head in his lap. The scratching resumed - it was a comforting motion. "You really did."

.-.-.-.

"Look happy," said Max, later that same day. "I want you to, really."

"But, but…" stammered Jo. "Aren't you really disappointed?"

Max was back in his own living room with both of his parents. Rose was there too, listening with an expression of sheer fury on her face.

"No," said Max. "I didn't_ want_ to like her. She's not my mom, Mom - _you_ are."

"Then why did you want to meet her?" asked Garrett.

Max shrugged. "Curious. Rosie, don't look so angry, I'm okay."

"You might not have been," said Rose. "What a _bitch_!"

"I don't want any of you feeling unhappy about this," said Max. "I don't care what she thinks, and I'm never gonna see her again."

He was making a special effort to look relaxed, leaning back on the sofa with his feet on Hawks' tired and sprawled-out body (he had got his run after all). Max was being completely honest about his feelings, but his parents and his best friend were still all staring at him with pity in their eyes.

"We always knew she never cared about me," said Max. "I just wanted to make sure. I wanted… what's that word?"

"Closure?" Rose suggested.

"Yeah. Well, something like that. Can we please just forget about her now?"

They all looked surprised at that. Then Jo said, "Really? You actually want to _forget_?"

He shrugged again. "I forgot her once already."

"Oh." Jo, in the silence that followed, glanced at the clock. "It's really late, Rose."

"I'll walk you home," said Max, jumping to his feet.

"Okay, thanks," said Rose. "Are you sure, though? If anyone sees you they'll want you to stay and tell them all about today."

"Then I will," said Max. He looked at his parents. "You guys don't mind, do you?"

Garrett and Jo both mumbled their assent. They had said yes to everything lately.

.-.-.-.

They were already in the apartment building where Rose lived with her mother and father and sister, and ascending the stairs, when Rose said, "I can't _believe_ you're not feeling more emotional about this."

"Well, I got a little bit angry," Max confessed. "But not so she'd notice."

Rose shook her head, tight-lipped with fury. "If it was me…"

"Ro, how can you know? I mean, the woman that gave birth to you, she's… I mean, she's up these stairs waiting for you right now. You don't _have_ any other mom."

"Yeah, you're right," said Rose. "I'm sorry."

"Don't be sorry," said Max. "Actually she, she _did_ say something that made me feel… I don't know, weird. I didn't want to tell Mom and Dad because it seems…"

"What does it seem?"

They were on Rose's floor now. She walked a little way along the hall, but Max was reluctant to follow. He had in that moment decided to tell her what was on his mind, and he didn't want to be overheard by anybody on the other side of the door to the apartment. He stopped walking, and so did Rose.

"It shouldn't matter," he said. "But she said she wasn't sure who my father was."

"Right," said Rose. "I, um… yeah, why _does_ that matter?"

"I know I never really knew either of my birth parents," said Max. "But I knew kind of _who they were_, y'know? I knew their names. My mother was Jackie and my father was John. I knew John Sanford was my father for… _years_, ever since I asked."

"Oh, I see," said Rose. "You just want to know where you came from."

"But it shouldn't matter," Max said again. "It only matters where I am now."

"It's completely natural," Rose insisted. "Like, I only met Mom's mom a couple of times, and she was this completely irresponsible space case who never did any good to any of us - but I'm still curious about her to this _day _because she's my grandmother. Not that it's _at all_ the same thing, of course."

"No, it is," said Max.

"And it doesn't stop you feeling that way either."

She looked thoughtful, frowning down at her vastly oversized combat boots as though she hoped they would spell out a solution. Max was touched. To most people, Rose presented an indifferent and perhaps even cold front, and wasn't exactly likeable right away. But Max had known her since they were toddlers, and he knew what a big heart her small frame concealed. It was ironic, really. She looked so tiny and fragile, like a doll that would break with the slightest lack of care, but out of the two of them she was the strong one. He found life hard, and she had propped him up and helped him through more times than he could count. And now her priority was to relieve his feeling of rootlessness. He had always known she was beautiful, but as she stood there thinking only of his happiness, she suddenly looked radiant to him.

"I'll stop feeling like this," said Max. "There's nothing to do but wait."

"May I make a suggestion?" asked Rose.

"'Course."

"You could talk to Dawn."

"Talk to _Dawn_?" Max was strangely surprised by this suggestion. Dawn was just a kid, not yet thirteen, and he never would have thought of talking to her. Now that Rose had suggested it, though, he wanted to. Dawn would empathise with him completely.

"It's just a suggestion," said Rose. "I mean, I _know_ it's not really the same."

"Oh, I want to talk to her, I do!" Max exclaimed. "Oh, Rose… she's _so_ young."

Rose blinked. "So?"

"Well, it's all… you know, _emotional_ and stuff."

"She'll cope," said Rose. "She's lived with it longer than you have."

"But can I _do_ that?" Max demurred. "I mean, can you just call someone up and say, 'I don't know who my father is - can you talk me through it?' Is that manners? I don't even really know her that well," he added dubiously.

"She won't mind," said Rose. "She's a really sweet girl - she'll be happy to help. And you don't have to call her yourself if you think it seems forward. Go through Roland."

"Rose," said Max. "You're a genius. How do you have so many kick-ass ideas?"

"Can you finish walking me home now?" Rose said dryly. "My dad's gonna start thinking I've been raped and murdered and mugged and raped again, or something."

"Ouch," said Max, putting his arm around her to walk the last few yards to her door. He didn't think she'd mind that - he'd done it before.

He refrained from kissing her, though.

.-.-.-.

Dawn Jackson was brought to the Millers' house by her mother, Tara, and her uncle Roland. Roland might have been there because he was concerned about Max's mental wellbeing, or to rescue Garrett if Jo and Tara started encouraging each other to be immature, as sometimes happened when those two got together. It had been a while since the last time, though. Max hadn't seen Dawn since the new year, and it was now nearing the end of July.

She'd already grown. Max knew she was at that age where a kid just grows and grows and grows, but he was surprised anyway. She even had hips and breasts all of a sudden - more than Rose did, and Rose had been sixteen for months. But genetics had as much to do with that as age, of course. Rose's mother was small, whereas Dawn's was large and curvaceous. Dawn resembled Tara a great deal, but the likeness was watered down by the genes of… who knew? Max wondered how she didn't go crazy wanting to know.

No one was saying anything. Max opened his mouth, hoping some appropriate words would just fall out of it, but then Hawks rescued him by charging in and sniffing Roland's crotch. Roland pushed the dog away, and Dawn caught his attention to stop him from pursuing his seduction of her uncle. She got onto her knees - making herself significantly smaller than Hawks - and started rubbing his ears.

"Hey boy," she said, and then she did something no one ever did, in letting Hawks lick her face. Not very many people liked being licked by a tongue that size.

Roland looked disgusted, and said, "Dawn, dogs lick really horrible things, you know."

"Oh, charming," said Dawn. Then she looked up at Max, smiled and said, "Are you okay?"

"We'll be in the kitchen," said Garrett, and promptly disappeared.

Left alone with Max and Hawks by the front door, Dawn rose to her full height - again, rather more than Rose's already - and said, "I don't really know what to say to you."

"Come and sit down," said Max, leading her through to the living room. "Can I get you something to drink?"

"Are _you_ having anything?" asked Dawn.

"If you are." Wow, _this _was productive.

"I'll have a soda. Whatever you've got."

The four grown-ups in the kitchen all stopped talking abruptly when Max walked in. He crossed the room, took two sodas from the fridge and left again without even looking at them. He handed a can to Dawn, sat down with his and listened to the crack and fizz as they popped the drinks open. It was a beautiful sound.

"Doesn't it drive you nuts?" asked Max.

"Not really," said Dawn. "I mean, I wonder sometimes. What you might find is that you'll be walking down the street and you'll suddenly think, Hey, almost any one of these guys might be my father! But I guess maybe you had that before," she added.

"No," said Max. It had never occurred to him before, but now he was sure it would drive him mad every time he went out. "I didn't."

"The difference between you and me," said Dawn, "is that I could probably find out one day, if I ever wanted to."

"Do you think you _will _want to?"

"Right now I don't think I will." She shrugged. "Maybe I'll change my mind."

"I guess your mom remembers them," said Max.

"Of course she does," said Dawn, looking puzzled.

"Jackie doesn't remember."

"Oh."

"Is she still in touch with them?"

"I asked her," said Dawn. "She can get in touch with one of them, and there's another she could easily track down. There was one whose name she never even found out, he was just a one-night stand - but two out of three is all I need if I want to know who it is."

"Why _don't_ you want to know?" asked Max.

"Well, because… what would I do once I knew? Try to have a relationship with him? I mean, chances are it's _not_ the one-night stand - and I just don't think it would work."

"It might."

"Yeah, it might. But not until I'm older, probably."

"I wish it didn't matter to me," said Max. "I mean, I _have_ a dad."

"_I_ don't," said Dawn.

"I know. I met my mother, and she obviously didn't like me - or at least not after I started talking. The father's probably even worse. Have you heard about Jessica?"

"What about Jessica?"

"She's seeing Oscar's half-brother."

Dawn blinked. "Is she really? Wow - I'm surprised I haven't seen that in the news."

"Maybe the press haven't heard," said Max. "They'd probably pay a fortune."

Dawn laughed. "Are _you_ gonna tell them?"

"No, I can't - she's my friend. And anyway, money's not important."

"Yeah?" said Dawn. "What _is_ important?"

"Health," said Max. "And friends, and family."

"DNA?"

"No."

"See, Mom really believes she did me a favour," said Dawn. "She says she spent eighteen years being answerable to her father and she hated it. But me… I'm not even really answerable to _her_. She lets me do pretty much whatever I want - she's more like a friend than a mom, sometimes. Don't get me wrong, I love her, but… sometimes I think I missed out on really having _parents_, y'know?"

"Oh," said Max. "Well, you win - I wouldn't want to feel like _that_."

Dawn smiled at him - she smiled a lot, Max noticed - and said, "It's not a competition."

"I wanted you to tell me I was being stupid."

"But you're not."

"Promise me you won't ever touch drugs."

Dawn had been doing fine up until then, but suddenly she looked startled. "Why would I?" she asked.

"Well, because your mom doesn't tell you not to."

"Oh. Oh, I see. Well, she's told me all about drugs - just not in a preachy kind of way - and I'm not interested."

"If you're ever tempted," said Max, "get me to tell you about Jackie. She looked thirty years older than she is, and she was obviously miserable."

"And she missed out on having a really wonderful son," said Dawn, and suddenly Max was touched to his very core. "Are you _very_ upset that she didn't even like you?"

Max thought for a moment. He had told Rose and his parents that he was fine with it, but the truth was that he hadn't really thought about it. Then he said, "I don't know. How would you feel if you met your father and he didn't like you?"

"Extremely let down."

"Oh."

"I don't think I've helped," Dawn said apologetically.

"No, no, it's really good to talk to you," said Max. "Everyone's so sweet to me and they do their best, but I don't think they really _understand_."

"Well," said Dawn, "if you want to talk again, I'm happy to."

That seemed to be an end to it. Max wasn't sorry, because he'd been sitting still for all that time - he felt ready for a run in the park with Hawks. There wasn't anything else he wanted to say, and if he thought of something later, Dawn had said she'd be willing to listen. Rose was right: Dawn Jackson was a really sweet girl. She had one parent, and was absolutely nothing like her - it was really weird.

As Max shut the door on the three Jacksons, he heard Tara ask, "What did you say to him?" He could imagine how much she wanted to know. He couldn't believe that even Tara, with all of her views on patriarchy and the superfluity of fathers, had made the decision that she did without any qualms at all.

Max went to his room and got changed into something more sporty, and then told his parents, "I'm going for a run."

"Honey, do you feel better for that?" asked Jo.

"I feel great," said Max. "I wish I was as smart as Rose," for he hadn't forgotten how supportive she had been through all of this. One day he would have to find out what usually happened when best friends started dating - but right at that moment, he just needed that run.

"Well don't," said Garrett, in response to his son's last remark. "You're perfect the way you are."

The power of words was awe-inspiring to Max. Rose, Dawn, his father and mother… they'd all been able to lift his mood just with words. He wished that words came so easily to him. He took impeccable care of his body, but there was nothing much he could do about his mind. Maybe _that_ was what the class A drugs had done to him - severely damaged his attention span, and whatever part of the brain it was that responded to the linearity most people found so comforting. And what had one of the people responsible had to say for herself? _"You seem all right. Physically, at least." _She had given some indication that she could be proud of the body, but not of the boy. It _was_ disappointing, but with what his father - for he _was_ his father - had said, Max knew he didn't need to worry. As far as anyone that mattered was concerned, he was perfect.


	2. Chapter 2

**Rose**

Rose Rivera was having a strange morning in a strange bathroom. She spent ages in the shower, washing very thoroughly, even though she'd never felt less dirty in her life. She just felt like spending some time alone with her body, now that they finally understood each other. She was eighteen years old, five foot one and barely filled an A-cup bra. She knew how common it was for women to struggle with their weight, and she knew how mad any one of those women would be with her if they found out she didn't like being small. But with doctors constantly probing into her eating habits, clearly trying to dig up her non-existent anorexia, it was easy to feel a tad insecure about her size. It got on her nerves, the way doctors were. So many people were either too big or too small - it no longer seemed to be relevant whether or not they were healthy.

(Her father was good if she ever allowed herself to get riled by a doctor's opinion. He'd always say things like, "He's just a GP - he doesn't know shit," and, "If you feel fine, then you _are_ fine." He was furious the first time it happened, when she was four years old. "It's all, 'Watch what they eat, be careful about their sugar intake, oh no, childhood obesity, send them all to fat camp!' And then we take him Rose and she's too small!")

For years, Rose had felt like a little girl in a Victorian children's novel who just couldn't conform, in stark contrast to a prettier and better behaved older sister (she had read a great many books like that in her time - they were surprisingly common). _Her_ older sister, Conchita, seemed to be lacking in nothing. She was pretty and clever, and had both a lovely figure and a very sweet nature. All of that combined meant that some people - particularly other young women - found it difficult to like her, but Rose didn't begrudge her any of it. She loved her sister like crazy; it was just that she couldn't help wondering why Conchita had got _all_ of the height and waist-to-hip ratio. She had started menstruating at the very reasonable age of thirteen, whereas Rose had been _so_ nearly seventeen when her turn finally came.

What made it worse for Rose was that her mind, as well as her body, didn't seem to be quite conventional. She was never tortured or made unhappy by any of it, but she had often found herself puzzled by the way she was. Conchita - for Rose was always comparing herself to her sister - _liked_ things. She liked clothes, movies, music, animals, boys, going out, having fun, having a life… but Rose just wasn't like that. She didn't like animals (the exception being cats), she didn't like socialising with people her own age (except, on special occasions, Max) and she didn't give a damn about clothes and makeup and all the other shit girls were into. She had never felt _normal_. Until now. She'd had a good night, and suddenly it all made sense. Her mind, body and soul had all more than compensated for any problems they might have caused her in the past.

When Rose finally ventured out of the bathroom, she found Anna scrabbling around in a kitchen cupboard. Anna looked up as Rose approached her, and said, "The bread's gone bad so I've only got muesli."

"I don't understand why anyone eats muesli," said Rose.

"You would if you had _my_ metabolism," said Anna. "Sit down - you'll have to have some because it's _literally _all I've got."

She was about five foot two - short, to most people - and she was curvy. Maybe she was genetically predisposed to weight gain, which couldn't have been much fun at her height.

"I'll get some more food in," said Anna, dumping a bowl of muesli on the table in front of Rose. "I'd have gotten something yesterday if I'd known you were coming."

"Sorry," said Rose.

"Don't be," said Anna.

Rose watched her as she tipped the last of the muesli into a bowl, poured the dregs of her milk supply on it and then sat down to eat. Anna really was the most beautiful creature Rose had ever seen. She'd thought so even before she realised there was anything sexual in it. When they'd been at their first class - a very basic drawing lesson that most of the students found insulting - and the failed artist teaching it had called out (immediately after Rose Rivera) the name Anna Rodriguez, Rose had expected the response to come from somebody who looked at least a little bit Italian. She was surprised, therefore, when the name was answered by the blue-eyed blonde sitting next to her. Anna had caught her looking, stared blankly for a moment and then murmured, "I hope he's more enthusiastic about teaching the class than he is about calling the roll."

"Do you really hate muesli that much?" Anna said now. "Or are you wishing you hadn't come here last night after all?"

"Neither," said Rose. "I'm really glad I came." She paused, then added, "That sounded better in my head."

"Hey," said Anna, smirking slightly, "don't sweat it. I'm glad you came too."

"Last night was really great."

"Mmm."

"And it'll go on being great. I meant what I said - I love you."

"Good," said Anna. "So why the long face?"

"Well," said Rose, "there's something I feel I should tell you."

"Go on."

"Last night, before I came here, I went out on a date."

"Oh! Who with?"

"My friend Max."

"You went out with a guy?" asked Anna. "Didn't you tell me you'd never been interested in guys, or did I just make that up?"

"I might have said that," said Rose. "I never have been. But I just wanted to check."

"Why?" asked Anna. "_I_ don't need to check. Do you think straight people check?"

"No, I guess not. I didn't really think about it."

"So what about the way you said you'd been feeling about _me_? Did you feel that way with him too?"

"God, no - not even close."

"Then why go to him first?"

"Oh, stop," Rose said irritably. "You're being paranoid."

"You must have felt _something_ if you wanted to go out with him," said Anna.

"I did - he's my best friend. I love him, but… not like I love you."

"Yeah?" She still looked suspicious. "So how _do_ you love him?"

"Well," said Rose, "sort of like I love my sister, I guess. I wish I'd figured that out sooner - I feel bad about him now. He took me out, and I told him I was a lesbian."

"Poor guy," said Anna, suddenly softening. "How did he take it?"

"Pretty good. Well, he seemed to. He was adamant I wouldn't lose him as a friend."

"Well then you probably won't."

"I'd like to go and see how he is."

"So do."

"I will," said Rose. "Later. I can't see him yet, though - not until I've been home."

"Oh, okay. Why is that?"

"Well, he advised me to tell my family as soon as possible. He said that if I didn't tell them straightaway I'd keep putting it off and putting it off and it'd only get harder."

"Yeah? Will it bother them?"

"Max said it wouldn't," said Rose, "and I know he's right. But I'm still scared."

"Well, yeah," said Anna. "Me too."

"What'll you do - just call them?" asked Rose.

"I don't know. People have this thing about not being able to say certain stuff over the phone, don't they? Maybe this is one of those times."

"So… what, you'll wait 'til you next go home?"

"Probably." Anna let out a long sigh, and put her chin in her hand. "Knowing me I'll just put it off and put it off like your Max said."

"That doesn't sound like a good idea to me," said Rose. "I'm telling mine today."

"Yeah, well - _you_ seem confident they'll be okay with it."

"They love me. And anyway, it shouldn't be _that_ big a deal. Homosexuality has pretty much been considered socially acceptable since before you and I were even born."

"So what? We've had racial equality _supposedly_ since the middle of the twentieth century, but there's still an alarming amount of racism in this country."

"You're being negative," said Rose.

Anna simply shrugged, and said, "Well."

"Your parents love you, don't they?"

"Don't goad me, Rose. I'm not going to commit myself to anything."

"Okay, fine," said Rose. "But _I'm_ gonna go and come out to my family right now."

"Okay then, babe," Anna said dully. "Let me know how it goes."

.-.-.-.

In the apartment block lobby she met Conchita, who was wearing a long overcoat that almost certainly concealed an immodest outfit of some kind. Under _her_ coat Rose was wearing a very typical black sweater, mid-length skirt and knee-boots. She hadn't made any special effort for Max, and now wished she'd thought to wonder why that was, instead of letting him kiss her before she realised she _definitely_ didn't want him like that.

"Oh, hi," Conchita said pleasantly. "Nice night?"

"Er, yeah," said Rose.

"Aww, I'm so happy for you," Conchita went on, pulling her sister into a crushing hug.

"Um, Chi, I didn't…"

"You didn't what?"

"You shouldn't jump to conclusions."

"Oh." Conchita pulled away, looking puzzled. "Okay then."

"You coming up?" asked Rose, heading for the stairwell.

Predictably their mother was out of bed, and their father wasn't. Kylie Griffin was feeding their cat, Iago, a slightly overweight tabby named after the Disney parrot (rather than the Shakespeare villain) when Conchita and Rose were little girls.

"Oh, hello," said Kylie, when her daughters found her in the kitchen. "Good night?"

"Not the best," said Conchita. "I finished with him this morning."

"You never said," Rose said sharply.

"You didn't ask," said Conchita. "And anyway, I didn't want to detract from…"

"From what?"

"From, from whatever you were doing last night."

Kylie cut a quick glance at Rose, and then said to Conchita, "_You_ finished it?"

"Yes," said Conchita.

Kylie nodded approvingly. "Good."

"Why?" asked Rose. "I thought you liked this one."

"Well I start off liking all of them, don't I?" said Conchita. "But it wasn't working out. He was getting really possessive, and he kept finishing my sentences and stuff - it was a bit too claustrophobic."

"_Your_ problem is that you're too nice," said Rose. "You attract guys who want their girlfriend to be a total walkover, and then they find out you're not and _you_ find out they're complete jerks and you have to split up."

"Are you okay, honey?" asked Kylie.

"I'm fine," said Conchita. "I never _really_ thought he was the guy I'd fall head over heels in love with. Maybe I should just stop trying. Sometimes I think just hoping for it is better than finding out I got it wrong _again_."

"Sweetie, there's no point in wanting it or not wanting it," said Kylie. "I didn't used to particularly want love, but if it happens it happens - and you can be happy either way."

"Oh, I'm happy," Conchita assured her. "But everybody wants _something_, don't they?"

"I guess so," said Kylie, cutting another look at her younger daughter.

"I might just get changed," said Conchita, "before Dad gets up."

She turned and walked out of the room, followed by a very satisfied looking Iago, who had just finished his breakfast. Rose watched them go, wondering how her sister had the nerve to go out with a string of men and sleep with _all_ of them. Their father hated it. He never said so in as many words, but it was obvious.

"It's a dumb idea to want it, if you ask me," said Rose. "It means she picks up every bozo who looks her way on the off chance that he might be the right one."

"It's not an uncommon method," said Kylie. "I never went in for it, though."

"But you were younger than her when you met Dad."

"I was your age, sweetie."

It was obvious to Rose that her mother sensed something in her. It might have been her fear, or the fact that she herself had fallen in love. Kylie had seemed to know, without any real clues, when Conchita lost her virginity. Rose supposed she was now technically still a virgin, but emotionally she wasn't - for she and Anna had expressed their love physically, never mind their anatomy - so maybe it was that. Or maybe it was all of these things combined that was making Kylie look at her in that quintessentially mom-ish way.

"Sometimes I worry about her," said Kylie. "I think you do too, don't you? She's so keen to fall in love, I worry that maybe she'll settle for just anything."

Rose nodded. "People do, it seems to me."

"I worry about you too," Kylie went on, speaking slowly and carefully now. "You've always been so _quiet_. Even when you were a little girl, you hardly ever told me what was on your mind. You seem okay, but I can never really be sure."

"I didn't usually _have_ much on my mind," said Rose. "I told you when I was unhappy, though, didn't I? And I still would."

Kylie smiled and said, "Good," though she didn't look exactly reassured.

Rose wondered what to tell her. She was glad that her mother wasn't pressuring her for information, though she was clearly worried. Rose didn't doubt that Kylie would be completely receptive to her news. There wasn't a trace of homophobia in her, besides which she loved both of her daughters unconditionally. In fact, if pushed, Rose would probably say she was a little bit closer to her mother than she was to her father. She felt comfortable telling Kylie anything, if she had something to tell, and she wasn't afraid of telling her this. It was actually a real effort not to. She could have told Conchita about Anna down in the lobby, too; but she wanted to tell them all together. She didn't want to show any favouritism, and she didn't want to have to find the words more than once.

But she had to say something. Kylie _knew_ there was something on her mind, and anyway, Rose wanted to speak. So she said, "I didn't spend last night with Max."

"I thought not," said Kylie.

"Don't worry - I wasn't doing anything I shouldn't."

"The thought never crossed my mind."

"I'll tell you," said Rose. "When Dad and Chita are both here."

At this, quite suddenly, Kylie looked reassured. Rose thought she might have guessed. Well, why not? With mother's intuition and the odd clue dropped into that last exchange, it probably wasn't hard to figure out that she had spent the night with a lover who wasn't Max. As to that lover being female… well, she _might_ have guessed, or she might not.

"So how _is_ Max?" asked Kylie.

"He seemed okay," said Rose, "when I left him."

"Don't sound so worried, baby. You know Max - you'd have been able to tell if he _wasn't_ okay. Actually, Rose, I don't think he ever loved you as more than a friend."

Slightly startled by this, and desperate for reassurance that she hadn't broken her best friend's heart, Rose asked, "Why? What makes you say that?"

"Well," said Kylie, "that boy has _always_ admired you, since long before you were old enough to start falling in love. I notice that he has this way of looking at you sometimes, when you help him or you show him a bit of kindness. Ever since you were kids he's had these moments of… of _gratitude_, I think, to have such a good friend. And then an hour or two later he'll be looking at you normally again. I think when he asked you out, it was probably in one of those moments. But I might be wrong," she added.

"Yeah, you might," said Rose. "There was a lot of guessing in there, wasn't there?"

"Yes," said Kylie, "but even if that was all a pile of complete shit that I just made up, I at least know he's honest, and so do you. Did he _say_ he was okay?"

"Yes."

"Then he _is_ okay. Oh, hi," as Conchita walked in, now wearing jeans and a sweater, followed by a bleary-eyed Eduardo - her father.

"Hi, Rosie," said Eduardo, and he dropped a kiss on the top of his younger daughter's head as he passed her. "How was your date with Max?"

"It was weird," said Rose.

"That doesn't surprise me," said Eduardo, yawning.

"We won't be going on another date," said Rose.

"Oh." Eduardo woke up then, suddenly looking extremely surprised. "But you…"

Rose waited.

"You didn't come back last night," Conchita put in helpfully.

"No," said Rose. "No, I didn't. I was with… there's someone else."

"Who?" Eduardo and Conchita asked in unison. He sounded both alarmed and suspicious, while she sounded only astonished.

"Someone I met at college," said Rose, quietly telling herself not to keep putting off giving them the _real_ news. "Another woman."

After that, she didn't dare look. She was staring down at her feet, and sensing only surprise. But Kylie didn't sound surprised when she said, "Honey, come on, look at us."

Rose looked up. Kylie was smiling reassuringly, Eduardo looked mildly surprised and Conchita was agape with astonishment.

"Chita, why do you look so surprised?" asked Rose.

"Sorry," said Conchita. She closed her mouth, but then opened it again to say, "Because you went out with Max."

"Oh." Rose looked away. "That again. Oh God, I feel terrible about that," and suddenly she felt like crying.

"Oh honey, cheer up," said Kylie, putting her arm around her child. "We've already established Max is fine. You should be happy, if you've fallen in love."

"_Have_ you?" Conchita asked interestedly.

"Yeah," said Rose. "I have."

"So what's her name?" asked Eduardo, speaking for the first time, which flooded Rose with relief. She didn't really think it would bother him, but even so, he was the one she'd been least confident about.

"Anna."

"When do we get to meet her?"

"I, I don't know. So… it doesn't bother you?"

"Rose, come on," said Eduardo. "I love you and I just want you to be happy."

It was all very emotional: the relief, the memories of the night before, the guilt about Max… Rose said, "I have to go to the bathroom," and she wasn't lying. She was glad of it. How else did one end a conversation like that?

She was wandering into the living room when Eduardo intercepted her and whispered furtively, "Actually, Rose, it's really good news as far as I'm concerned."

Rose blinked in surprise. "Is it?"

"Of course it is. I've been _dreading_ you getting involved with men. I mean, just look at how they treat your sister - I can't stand it."

"They're not _all_ bad," said Rose, amused, though she rarely laughed out loud.

"No," said Eduardo, "but a lot of them are. Women are better. _Querida_, I'm happy for you," and he started stroking her hair. "You didn't _really_ think I'd mind, did you?"

"No," said Rose. "Not really."

"You _are_ happy, aren't you?" he asked, in more earnest tones. "You never really went in for smiling much - it's hard to tell."

"Of course I'm happy," said Rose. "But I'm not gonna feel like smiling until I've seen that Max is really okay."

.-.-.-.

There wasn't a huge quantity of security measures in the Riveras' basic walk-in apartment block, whereas the Millers lived in one of those ones where you had to announce yourself via intercom and then be buzzed in. Rose's summons was answered by Garrett, who said, "Ooh, sorry - Max doesn't ever want to see you again."

"_What_?" cried Rose.

There was a scuffling noise, followed by Max's voice: "Sorry, Rose, he thinks he's being funny. Come on in," and the buzz that followed was almost as much of a relief as his jovial tone of voice had been.

Hawks started slobbering all over her chest the moment she went in. She heard, "No Hawks, come away - come on," and then she saw that Max was pulling him back. "Hey, can you guys… take him somewhere?"

"Yeah, sure," Garrett said distractedly. He and Jo were both there, looking at Rose with questions all over their faces. It was obvious what had happened: Max had gone home the night before and told them that their date hadn't worked, but refused to tell them why.

"I'm gay," Rose blurted out.

"Oh," said Max, "does it get easier with practice?"

"I doubt it," said Rose. "But _they're_ not gonna care, are they?"

"We might just leave you to it," said Jo, dragging Hawks towards the kitchen whilst trying to motion for Garrett to follow her.

"So," said Max, as though nothing new had happened between them, "how did it go?"

"I don't want to talk about me," said Rose.

"Oh… okay then."

"Are you _really _going to be able to carry on being my friend?"

"Ro, c'mon, get over yourself," Max said lightly. "Look, let me tell you something. It wouldn't have worked out with you and me even if you were straight."

"Wouldn't it?" asked Rose, surprised.

"Nah. When we kissed… it was nice. You're really hot - you know that, don't you?"

"Um…"

"But it didn't feel any different than kissing Nina or Debbie or any other girl I've been out with, and I broke up with all of them and now we're not even friends. So it's better that you stopped it when you did."

"Really?" asked Rose. "Do you mean that?"

"'Course I do," said Max. "I mean… look, don't take this the wrong way, but when I got home last night I thought about how it was when I kissed you, and then I realised that it actually felt really _weird_, like I shouldn't have done it. I mean… you're the closest thing I've got to a sister. Don't barf," he added.

"Don't worry, I won't," said Rose, touched.

"Look, come in and sit down," said Max. "Can I tell you something else?"

"Sure," said Rose, following him to the living room and ultimately the couch.

"I kinda had a crush on you for _ages_. I mentioned that time when I met Jackie, didn't I, last night when I was encouraging you to - "

"Yes."

"Well, that was the first time it happened. You were being so good to me, and I just thought, Whoa, she's _awesome_! But then the next day… it wore off a little bit. That was why I didn't ask you out years ago - because it kept happening but then it always just went away again, y'know? I'm not making any sense, am I?" he added ruefully.

"Not really," said Rose, though she thought what he was saying sounded a little like those wild guesses her mother had taken. "Look, let's just draw a line under it now, shall we?"

"Okay, cool," said Max. "So how _did_ it go with whatshername?"

"Anna," said Rose. "It went really well."

"So she's gay too?"

"Yes."

"Did you know that already? I mean, after you got out of the cab, I wondered whether you were going to, like, find out if she felt the same way or if you already knew she did."

"I think she knew as much as I did," said Rose. "I mean, I always had the impression that she felt that way about me, but… well, I'd rather not give you details."

"I'm not asking you to," said Max. "So can we talk about girls now?"

"What?"

"You heard."

"Oh, well… I suppose so, if you like."

"Cool," said Max, his grin widening. He genuinely _was_ okay with all of this. "So what about Eden Spengler? She's really hot, isn't she?"

"Well," said Rose, considering, "I wouldn't say no. If it wasn't for Anna, I mean."

"Cool. Who else?"

"Max, you're not… _imagining_ things, are you?"

"Rose, c'mon, I would never," said Max. "Who else?"

"Um…" Rose found herself running through all of the women she knew in her mind, wondering why the hell she was going along with such a juvenile conversation. "That Marie woman's pretty hot."

"What, Ghostbuster Marie?"

"Yeah."

"Oh God, she's horny as hell," said Max, his eyes widening as though at some traumatic memory. "Y'know, she likes guys, but I'm not so sure she wouldn't try it with you."

"But she won't, because I'm seeing someone," said Rose.

"Oh yeah. When can I meet her?"

"God, why does everybody ask me that?"

"What everybody?" Max asked interestedly. "Who else have you told?"

"Just Mom and Dad and Chita," said Rose. "They were fine with it."

"That's because they love you," said Max. He didn't say "I told you so", or anything close, and Rose loved him for it.

"When you said my family would be cool with it," she said, "you were just thinking of those three, weren't you? You didn't take Carlos into account."

"Ooh, yeah, Carl," Max said sombrely, wrinkling his nose. "Y'know, if I was related to Carl, and I was gay…"

"Yeah?"

"I just wouldn't tell him."

.-.-.-.

When Rose next saw Anna, they went out to dinner and acted much like any other love struck new couple: coy, awkward and a little bit juvenile. Then, over the main course, Anna volunteered the information that she hadn't found the courage to tell her family yet.

"Don't be mad at me," she finished, looking uncharacteristically sheepish.

"I'm not," said Rose. "I understand. I'm not out of the woods yet either - there's still some people I have to tell. Anna… would you come to dinner with my family on Friday night?" she added, as the idea suddenly occurred to her. "It's this big thing my aunt organised ages ago. She won't mind you coming because she was expecting my sister's boyfriend, but they broke up, so… will you?"

"And what, you'll come out to them?" asked Anna.

"I'll introduce you as my girlfriend," said Rose. "They can't kick up a stink if you're actually _there_… can they?"

.-.-.-.

Eduardo seemed even more anxious than Rose felt, which was saying something. They all chipped in some money for a cab, and while Kylie was paying the driver Eduardo took Rose to one side and hissed, "Are you _sure_ you wanna tell my mother?"

Rose raised her eyebrows, looking at him through the dim autumn evening light, and said, "You want me to lie to her?"

"Oh Rose," said Eduardo. "She won't like it."

"What's the worst that could happen?"

"Oh, I don't know. She's not gonna take it well, honey." Then, "She's eighty-three."

"So what? It's not gonna _kill_ her, Dad."

"Well…"

"Oh don't be ridiculous. What the hell is this, anyway?" She felt disappointed - let down, even - after feeling so close to him following that talk they had when she told him about Anna. "It's who I am, Dad. _You're_ the one who's always telling me to be myself and not care what other people - "

"Ah honey, I know, I know," said Eduardo, his voice suddenly full of regret. "You're right, I'm sorry. You're so brave, Rosie," he added, putting his hands on her shoulders. "I'm glad you don't take after me that way."

That silenced Rose, and she smiled weakly, absolutely loving him for it - but at the same time she wished he hadn't said it. There was no way she could chicken out now. Up until that point, she had thought that she could. Anna might be disappointed to be introduced just as a friend from college, but she would understand.

"Hey, don't be nervous," said Eduardo, catching sight of Anna lurking awkwardly near a street lamp. "They won't bite."

"They're gonna hate me," said Anna. "_I _know what you're talking about over there."

"Don't worry about it," said Eduardo, who had been getting along famously with Anna all evening. She and Kylie seemed to like each other too, which Rose was delighted about, though she had the feeling that Anna was just putting up with Conchita, a little bit. "You don't wanna care what my brother thinks, and my mom… well, she'll be tactful."

"Yeah, maybe," Rose muttered dubiously.

Once they were all in Carl Rivera's living room, with six pairs of eyes trained curiously onto a very hunted looking Anna, Rose decided she should just get it over with. She opened her mouth and said, "Okay, introductions. This is my grandmother Carlota, my uncle Carl, my aunt Beth, my cousin Kevin, his wife Rachel and their daughter Emma," here indicating a blue-eyed blonde in her thirties and her three-foot brown-eyed miniature. "Everyone, this is Anna." Yikes. "My new girlfriend."

She expected an awkward silence, but it was worse. Carlota caught everyone's attention by muttering, "_Nombre de dios_," and looking like she might be about to faint.

Rose forgot all about Carl, and even Anna, who couldn't have been enjoying this. She looked sharply at her grandmother and said, "Problem?"

Carlota started speaking Spanish, which instantly fuelled Rose's anger. She had always been told it was bad manners to speak Spanish around people who didn't know it. Anna, Rachel and Emma didn't speak a word, and Beth, Kylie and Kevin only knew what little bits they had been able to pick up.

She was saying something about what nature intended. Rose didn't have an answer to that, because quite honestly it _wasn't_ what nature intended. She knew that; she just didn't think it mattered. She only said, "Will you speak English?"

Carlota then said something about a child being present.

"Well we're not going to molest her!" yelled Rose.

She sensed that some people were starting to move off, but she didn't look at them. Carlota started again, still speaking Spanish; she was certainly animated for an eighty-three year old. This time it was about God, which came as a surprise to Rose. She knew her grandmother was Catholic, but she had rarely known her to enforce her beliefs onto others. There had been a huge fight when Eduardo refused to be confirmed at thirteen, apparently, but that was ancient history. Rose had never been subjected to it… until now.

When Carlota mentioned the Bible, Rose interrupted her stream of Spanish by saying firmly, "I'm not having that. I mean, Jesus, have you ever actually _read_ that thing?" (Oops - she didn't really mean to blaspheme just then.) "Even if I _wanted_ to live my life by it I couldn't - there's nothing in it for me."

"Of course there is," snapped Carlota, switching to English at last, for whatever reason.

"Yeah?" Rose said challengingly. "So come on - where _exactly _does it say I can't prefer girls? I know the bit about homosexuality - it goes, 'You shall not lie with a man as one lies with a woman.' How the _hell_ does that apply to me, huh? That book," she went on, a big part of her wanting to stop, but for some reason she couldn't, "was written _by_ men, _for_ men. There's nothing prohibiting women from expressing their sexuality however the hell they want! Me and her, we can't _spill our seed upon the ground_, or, or - "

"You've read it?" Carlota asked quietly.

"YES!" screamed Rose, unable to calm herself quite that quickly.

"Well," her grandmother said, "that's more than your father ever did."

Rose didn't say anything, realising suddenly that she was very out of breath.

"I'm sorry, Rose," said Carlota. "It's how I feel. I worry about you, you know - you'll go to Hell for it. I really believe that."

"I know you do," said Rose. She reached up and dug both sets of fingers into her hair (a habit she seemed to have got from Kylie's father), desperately trying to calm herself. "But I _don't_ believe that - I really don't. Can we just… I don't wanna hear it, okay?"

To Rose's great relief, Carlota said simply, "_Bale_," - the Spanish for "okay" - and then fell silent. Rose didn't know what to do next. She was still surprised Carlota had played the Hell card. She had told both of her granddaughters all about her faith (on occasions when there was no danger of Kylie overhearing), and both had listened with interest before deciding to reject it. She didn't push, and Rose had always admired her for that.

"Shit, where'd Anna go?" she muttered, as she noticed that the only people who remained in the room - besides Carlota and herself - were her three immediate family members.

Carl's voice came from somewhere, and with no better strategy Rose decided to follow it. She was astonished to find that her brash and weighty uncle had taken Anna into the dining room and was saying gently, "I'm really sorry about her. She's just…"

"Old-fashioned?" Anna said dryly.

"Well… yes."

"Hey, I get it - _my_ grandmother's the same. She's gonna go nuts."

"At least she'll go nuts in English," said Rose.

"Oh, hi," said Anna, smiling warmly as Rose approached. "Um… everything okay now?"

"Well, I shut her up. I'm - "

"Sorry, I know."

Rose was faintly amazed by how civil Carl was being, and then when Anna put her arm around her she had a sudden urge to kiss her - just for a second, or less - to see whether Carl would react. He looked away awkwardly, but no more awkwardly than when Eduardo or Kevin kissed their spouses in front of him.

"Carl," said Rose. She had always refused to call him Uncle Carl, even as a very small child, but just this once she wasn't going to annoy him by mimicking her father's habit of calling him Carlos.

"Yeah?" he said.

"Thanks for looking after her."

"She's a guest in my house," Carl said simply, just as Eduardo came in, and Rose knew instinctively that he had been giving his mother a thorough telling off.

"Are you okay, Rose?" asked Eduardo.

"Oh, yeah, sure," said Rose. "I'm fine until I go to Hell."

Eduardo looked pained for a moment, and then his gaze slid over to Carl.

"It's really fine," Anna said quickly, seeming to pick up on something in the look between the two brothers. "Please don't apologise for her again. I mean, she believes what she believes - I respect that."

"Well _that's_ good of you to say," Carl said bluntly.

Rose looked then at her father, trying to say with one of her rare little smiles: _Yes, he's really okay with it!_ Eduardo smiled fondly at her, then looked at Carl with a respect that Rose thought she may have seen before, though she couldn't begin to remember when or why. But then he slightly ruined it when he said, "Carlos?"

"Yeah?" Carl grunted.

"What if it was Kevin?"

"That doesn't matter," snapped Carl. "It's _not_ Kevin."

The conversation may or may not have gone further, but then Beth and Rachel stopped it by wandering in with plates. Rose leaned closer to Anna and murmured, "The women do the food at these things. This house is a little bit twentieth century, I'm afraid."

"Really?" said Anna. "I hadn't noticed."


	3. Chapter 3

**Conchita**

When Conchita Rivera told her parents that she needed to spend the night with them, because she thought she might have broken up with her boyfriend of two and a half years, her father's reaction was, "Why? What did he do?"

"He didn't _do_ anything," said Conchita. She was standing over both of her parents, who were sitting on the couch; she'd interrupted them watching _A Night to Remember_.

"Who finished it?" Eduardo demanded.

"I'm not sure."

"I'm gonna kill him."

"How do you know it was his fault?" asked Conchita.

"Well it's not _your_ fault."

"How do you know?"

"It never is. I _knew_ he was gonna - ow!" as Kylie elbowed him in the ribs.

"Honey, come here, sit down," she said, scooting over to make room on the couch. "Now what happened, exactly?"

"Well," said Conchita, "we had a pretty big fight."

"What kind of fight?" Eduardo asked sharply, his eyes falling to her arm, and Conchita had the feeling he wanted to roll up her sleeve and check for bruising.

"Dad, I've told you before, he's not violent," she said, shifting uncomfortably under his gaze. "The fight had absolutely nothing whatsoever to do with his being a cop."

Eduardo scoffed, and said, "You wanna bet?"

"Eduardo, stop it," snapped Kylie. "Chita, are you _quite sure_ it's over?"

"No," said Conchita.

"Only I thought you loved him."

"I do. Oh God, I hate this part." On the TV screen, the _Titanic_ was sinking rapidly with more than half its passengers still on board - including a very frightened (if badly dubbed) little boy who had been separated from his mother - and Conchita burst into tears.

She felt the weight on either side of her shifting, and she was left alone to weep for however long it took. When the tears finally dried up she became aware of her parents' voices humming in the background. She looked round, and saw them by the kitchen doorway. Eduardo was talking animatedly, and Conchita caught the words, "Just look at what he's _done_ to her!"

"Dad, it was the movie," she said.

Eduardo just stared at her. Then Kylie said gently, "Honey, how about if I run you a nice hot bath?"

"Thanks, Mom," said Conchita, smiling weakly, and Kylie disappeared. "Dad, don't look like that. Dennis is a really lovely guy."

"Then why break up with him?" asked Eduardo.

Conchita shook her head. She had absolutely no idea what the answer was to that. Then she said feebly, "It's… you know…" - she wrinkled her nose - "_complicated_."

"Oh," her father said. "I hate it when that happens."

"I wish you liked him."

"I don't mind him." Eduardo went back to the couch and put both of his arms around her. "I just wish he - "

"He wasn't a cop, I know."

"He's managed to stick around longer than the rest of them, I'll give him that. Are you _absolutely sure_ you love him?"

"Yes."

"Well then I don't get what happened," said Eduardo, "if it's not his fault."

"Well I think," Conchita said slowly, as Kylie wandered in from the bathroom, "it _might_ be his fault."

Eduardo was suddenly in Protective Father Mode again. "Why? What did he do?"

Conchita looked at him despairingly. "Dad…" Then her cell phone rang. She pulled it out of her jacket pocket, and started when she saw who was calling.

"It's Oscar!" she squeaked.

Eduardo and Kylie exchanged a puzzled look. Then Eduardo said, "So?"

"So why is he calling _me_? Why is he calling me _now_?"

"Honey, don't panic," Kylie said soothingly. "He might be calling to tell you that Jessica had her baby."

"Is it that time already?" asked Eduardo, looking surprised.

Kylie shrugged, and said, "It was due in November, wasn't it?"

Feeling immensely relieved, and excited at the prospect of talking about one of her favourite subjects, Conchita answered the call.

"Hey, honey," Oscar said cheerfully. "How are you?"

Conchita tried not to look uncomfortable, so as not to excite Eduardo further. Oscar used to call her "honey" when she was a child, and had never given it up - and now for the first time in her life she wondered if maybe she was too old for it. She stood up, took the phone to the other side of the room and said, untruthfully, "I'm fine. How are you?"

"Edgy," said Oscar. "I'm stuck in traffic in a cab to the airport. Jess had the baby."

"Oh, yay!" Conchita exclaimed, her face breaking into a smile. She turned it onto her parents, who looked happy at the news they seemed to infer correctly, and she was glad to have distracted them from her own problems. "How is she?"

"She said she felt fine when I spoke to her," said Oscar. "It's a boy. Seven pounds… um, eight ounces, something like that. They're calling him Robbie."

"Aww - I can't wait to meet him."

"Me neither. This was the earliest I could get away - I was hoping he'd be late."

"It was really sweet of you to call and tell me."

"Well," said Oscar, "I wanted to gush to someone, and I knew you'd be more interested than the cab driver."

"I wonder how Tom's taking it," said Conchita.

"Aw, yeah, poor kid. It's a shock, isn't it? You're the centre of the universe for two or three or five years, and then suddenly this screaming monster drops in and steals your parents and all your stuff. I'll tell you how he is when I see you. How about dinner?"

"Dinner?" echoed Conchita, her eyes widening.

"Chita, don't sound like that. We're friends, aren't we?"

"Er… yeah."

"Well, if you don't want to…"

"No, no, I do," said Conchita, sensing that she'd hurt his feelings.

"Great. How about Friday?"

"That's the day after tomorrow."

"I know," said Oscar. "It doesn't _have_ to be Friday, if you've already got - "

"No, fine, great. Friday's great."

"Cool. I'll ask Jess if I can bring you to see Robbie first."

"Well don't make her feel like she has to say yes."

"Conchita, my sister has _never_ felt like she had to say yes," said Oscar. "Look, are you okay? Because you sound a bit…"

"What?" Conchita asked nervously.

"Weird."

"I just had a really big bust-up with Dennis."

"Oh! But you said you were fine."

"I lied," said Conchita. "I'll tell you about it on Friday," and she hung up before Oscar had a chance to say anything else.

.-.-.-.

Conchita _was_ permitted to see Robbie on Friday evening. There was no question of him being in hospital; Jessica had vowed never to set foot in a maternity ward again after her experiences having Tom, and given birth to her second child in her own living room. Conchita saw Tom that evening too, as he was wandering around in his pyjamas not going to bed. It looked as though his parents had started trying to make him go, and then just given up. He really was a beautiful little boy, with his mother's dark curls, his father's blue eyes and - oddly enough - Oscar's face. Neither of his parents was particularly striking, but evidently Barrett/Wallance DNA was a good combination.

"God, Chita, these are always so _original_," said Jessica, swaying from side to side with her baby on one arm while Conchita showed her a romper suit embroidered with the Statue of Liberty along the left side, and Big Ben on the right (Hayden, Robbie's father, was English). "I told you before, you should do a whole line in baby clothes - this is _way_ better than all the ducks and bunnies and sh- and stuff you always get in stores. You could sell them on the internet - you'd make a killing."

Conchita said exactly the same thing as she had two years before, when Tom was a baby: "Well I don't think very many other parents want to dress their babies in anything this original. Most people _like_ ducks and bunnies."

"That's just because they don't know any better," said Jessica. "Where's the harm in trying? I'll help you, since I'm not doing any more houses for a while." It was the same conversation of two years ago, almost word for word.

"Jess, don't goad her," said Oscar, who by this time had been got to by Tom - the pearl of his world - and was building a tower out of multicoloured wooden blocks.

Tom was surprised and grateful when Conchita gave him a congratulations-on-becoming-a-brother present. He'd probably thought that, after his birthday two weeks earlier, that was it until Christmas. It was only a stupid little toy she'd bought, but she thought he'd appreciate it because she remembered feeling a little hard done by when Rose was a baby, and everyone had given her presents but apparently forgotten that she had an older sister.

Robbie, needless to say, was adorable. There seemed to be a popular opinion among some people that babies were unattractive and/or boring in the first few weeks, and Conchita - though she would never say so - despised this narrow way of thinking. She held Robbie, becoming intoxicated on his milky smell while Hayden, Jessica and Oscar combined their efforts to get Tom to bed - and then she was reluctant to let the child go. It was a problem she had with babies. If she was given one to hold, she wanted to keep it.

Conchita had always wanted to love the man she eventually settled down with, but she wanted babies more. She knew her family worried that she'd settle for just anything, and at the back of her mind she was sure that if it really came down to it, she would take any man who was halfway likeable and was producing plenty of live sperm. But then she fell in love, and she had thought she wouldn't have to worry about that anymore.

"Whoa, whoa, wait a minute," said Jessica, when she finally persuaded Conchita to give her her baby back. "Is he _asleep_?"

"Yeah, he went off just now."

"I don't believe it! He's _never_ done that before! Hayd, put him somewhere," and Jessica bundled the sleeping baby into his father's arms. "I'm going to bed."

"The table's booked for eight, Chita," said Oscar. It was seven thirty.

"Oh, okay," Conchita said distractedly, still staring fixedly at Robbie.

"Come and see him lots," said Hayden, who had got to know Conchita a lot better than he used to since he started making babies. "_Please_.We haven't slept in two days."

"Hey." Suddenly Jessica reappeared in the doorway. "Hayden, when he cries just bring him in, stick him on my boob, don't bother waking me."

.-.-.-.

"So are you gonna tell me about Dennis, then?" asked Oscar, once their food had arrived. "Please don't tell me it's over - I don't wanna hear that."

"Really?" Conchita asked interestedly. "Why?"

"Well because you're obviously crazy about him."

"Ah." Conchita looked down at her food, poked it a few times with her fork and then realised it was bad manners not to eat when she wasn't even paying. So she took a mouthful, and then said, "Well, I'm glad it's obvious to _you_, at least."

"What do you mean?" asked Oscar. "Can't _he_ see it?"

"Good guess."

"Well that's bullshit. Did you tell him he's being an idiot?"

"Yes."

"And did you tell him _why_ you love him?"

"No," Conchita said bluntly. "I don't see why I should start stroking his ego just because he's gotten paranoid."

"Honey, don't take this the wrong way," said Oscar, "but that sounded more like Jessica than you. Have you been taking tips or something?"

Conchita shrugged and took another mouthful of food, even though she didn't have much of an appetite. "I'm a nice person, Oscar, but I'm not a pushover. I don't want to start apologising to him, because I don't think I've done anything wrong."

"Well of course not," said Oscar. "_You've_ never done anything wrong in your life."

He said things like that sometimes. He seemed to see her as some kind of beacon of goodness; he thought she was better than she was. She didn't know what to say.

"Why on _earth_ would he think you don't love him?" asked Oscar.

"Well actually." She took a deep breath. "It's… it's because of you."

At this, Oscar started choking on his food, such as it was. It was a pretty insubstantial meal, really. His eating habits had fluctuated a lot in his early twenties, when he found it hard to cope with being in the public eye and was plagued by an irrational idea that he was going to stop being attractive. He'd confessed this youthful debacle to Conchita not very many years earlier, and said that he'd got over it (he didn't say how); but now that he was getting older, he'd started worrying again about putting on weight. He was thirty-seven - four months off thirty-eight - and he looked every minute of it, if not more. His tiring life, coupled with the self-inflicted physical burden rock stars often seemed to put themselves through, showed up in his face. He wasn't what he used to be, but that wasn't necessarily a bad thing; just different. He was still a very attractive man.

"_Me_?" said Oscar, once he'd recovered from his choking fit.

"Dennis doesn't like the way you call me honey and sweetheart and…" - she looked guiltily down at her plate - "and take me out to dinner and buy me expensive birthday presents and stuff."

"But that's completely innocent!" said Oscar. He looked genuinely shocked. "You and me, we're… we're friends."

That came as a relief. After Dennis had made her think about it, Conchita had started to wonder if maybe Oscar _did_ behave a little bit like a boyfriend towards her at times. Now she said, "I'm glad you said that."

"Well Chita, you didn't think I was - "

"No, no, of course not."

"You're too young."

"I'm twenty-four," said Conchita.

"Are you really?" said Oscar, looking surprised. "It doesn't seem like twenty-four years since you were a baby. I bottle-fed you a couple of times - it'd just be wrong to, to…"

"Sleep with me?"

"Well… yeah. Chita, listen to me. That guy is lucky to have you, and if he really insists on throwing away what you have together then _you're_ not losing half as much as he is."

Conchita sighed heavily. "That's a really sweet thing to say, Oscar, but it won't be much comfort if it really comes to that."

"I know, honey," Oscar said gently. "I know how much you want it."

"My mom once told me there was no point in wanting it or not wanting it," said Conchita. "She said if it happens, it happens."

"Well that's true," said Oscar. "I got everything else I wanted because it was something I could _make_ happen. But love isn't like that, really, is it?"

It was generally agreed that Oscar had made a success of his musical career through a combination of talent, good looks and a famous father. Hell, he even had _another_ father who was well known in the world of music. But he'd worked hard too, putting his quest for fame before everything else. What he said made Conchita feel a little uneasy, because she didn't particularly want anything she could _make_ happen. So many people she knew had a passion. Rose was going to be a revolutionary conceptual artist; their friend Max was an athlete; Oscar, of course, had his music. And what did she want? Babies.

She sometimes wondered why she didn't want more than that, when so many other people seemed to. Jessica had once said she wouldn't have a baby until she made a million dollars, and she had kept her word. She and her brother had both become millionaires in their twenties. Conchita had already procured for herself a little market stall where she sold homemade clothes and jewellery, and that was as far as her ambition stretched. When she had a baby, she wanted to strap it to her back and take it to work with her; that was her vision of happiness. It didn't seem like a lot, but she flattered herself that she'd solved the old dilemma of being a devoted mother without being financially dependent on a man. It was more attainable than Jessica's solution, certainly.

"You sound like you've given up," said Conchita, in response to Oscar's ruminations about the aloofness of love.

"Well," said Oscar, "it's not really a question of giving up. Like your mom said, if it happens, it happens. I don't think it's gonna happen with Natalie, though," he added.

Conchita blinked. "Natalie…?" She knew a Natalie, but she didn't think Oscar would have been seeing her.

"Daniels."

"_Daniels_?"

"Er, yeah," Oscar said awkwardly. "Whenever I come down here, she and I… we hook up. Didn't you know?"

"How could I?"

"Well she might have told you. You seem shocked."

"No, I'm not shocked," Conchita assured him. "I'm just surprised. I mean, if you think _I'm_ too young…"

"She's older than you."

"Yeah, not by much. You don't think you'll end up marrying her, then?"

Oscar laughed as though at the very idea. "I don't think Nat wants to get married."

"Neither did Jess."

"That's true. I'm not in love with Natalie, though - it's just… it's fun."

Conchita didn't really know what to say. She personally didn't see the appeal of having a relationship like that, but then again she hadn't really enjoyed sex very much pre-Dennis. She said, "I've been brought up to believe that we don't need other people to complete us, and I _do _believe it. But it's a nice idea, though, isn't it?"

"Yeah, it's a nice idea," said Oscar. "But look, I'm not _having_ this conversation with you - you're in love with Dennis."

"I _know_ I am!" Conchita said vehemently. "And I've told him enough times - it's down to him now to believe it."

"Y'know," said Oscar, "I'm actually quite furious with him for doubting you." He didn't sound furious at all. "You're the most sincere person I've ever met."

"Oh, I think he does believe it, really," said Conchita, trying to ignore the compliment. He was _very_ free with those things. "He just sees you as a threat because you're so good looking and you're famous and you've got all that money."

"Well, so what? Those aren't reasons to love someone. I mean, Jesus, hasn't he _noticed_ that you've been faithful to him for two and a half years? Why does he think _that_ is?"

"I've been telling myself the same thing. I need to tell him to snap out of it, don't I?"

"He can't believe his luck, that's what it is," said Oscar. "You are the sweetest, kindest person I have ever known - and on top of it all, you're beautiful. I imagine it'd be very easy to fall in love with you, and be terrified you'll find someone better."

"Oh, right," Conchita said numbly. "You… haven't just done it, have you?"

"Suppose I said I had," Oscar said levelly. "Would you still want to go to Dennis?"

"Yes."

"So then what the hell are you still doing here with me? Go get him!"

"Are you sure?" asked Conchita. She _wanted_ to go to Dennis and bury the whole stupid thing, but she wouldn't feel right about just walking out. "I mean, it seems a bit rude."

"Chita, this is _love_," said Oscar. "Don't worry about me."

"Oh, okay then," said Conchita, getting up from the table. "Um… Oscar…"

"Don't worry," he said. "I haven't."

.-.-.-.

If Conchita had gone to Dennis straight from Tom and Robbie, she might have blurted out, "IWANNABABY!" the moment she saw him. As it was, her uterus had had time to calm itself and her rational mind was in charge once again. When she found Dennis in their bedroom pulling on his police uniform, she said, "You're not going to _work_!"

"Er, yeah, my shift just changed," said Dennis. "I did tell you."

"Oh yeah, so you did," Conchita said dejectedly.

"Look," said Dennis, "I'm sorry I upset you. We'll talk about it tomorrow, okay?"

"Okay."

"I'd really like to do it now but I, I have to go to work."

"Of course you do," said Conchita. "Hey… what will you be doing tonight?"

"I don't know," said Dennis. "Whatever I'm told."

"Babe…"

"Yeah?"

"Don't get killed."

Dennis looked at her then with the expression of someone who had heard something touching from a small child, and said, "I'll be very careful."

"Oh don't look at me like that," Conchita said irritably. "It could happen."

"I know," Dennis said soothingly. "I know, Connie. I mean it - I'll be careful. But I don't want you to worry. We aren't in a cheesy novel - I'm not going to die tonight just because you're here waiting for me to come and patch things up after a fight."

"Can't we do it now?" asked Conchita. "I mean, you were only getting dressed when I came in - if you really do have to shoot off then you're not leaving yourself enough time."

"I'm _not_ leaving myself enough time," said Dennis. "I'm sorry, Connie - I really do have to go. I love you," he added, and he kissed her briefly on his way out.

Conchita smiled. "I love you too."

Well, that was a very promising start. Once he'd gone, she decided to call her parents. It was late, and she had grown up and moved out two years ago; but if she didn't call they might think that she had either got herself raped and murdered, or she was consoling herself about Dennis using Peter and Dana Venkman's house and their son's body.

"I've gone home," she told Kylie, over the phone. "Dennis had to go work but I think we're gonna be okay now."

"Are you going to tell me what the fight was about?" asked Kylie.

"Well," said Conchita, "don't tell Dad, but Dennis thought I was in love with Oscar."

"Dennis thought _what_?"

"Either that or Oscar was in love with me."

"Well I hope you're gonna tell him not to be so possessive, and you're your own person."

"I already did," said Conchita. "I think he took it to mean that I wanted to cheat on him and he wasn't allowed to mind."

Kylie sighed heavily, and said, "I had no idea he was so paranoid."

.-.-.-.

She managed to wake up before Dennis got home. Sitting up and sweeping her hair out of her eyes, Conchita saw that the bedroom floor had on it a few items of clothing she had thrown off during the night. Now she was down to shorts and a t-shirt. The t-shirt was baby-pink, and the hair falling over her face was very long. _Very_ long. She had big eyes too, and dimples, neither of which she could really do anything about, but it did occur to her to wonder if maybe she should try and make herself look a little bit more grown-up. It wasn't a girlfriend Oscar treated her like, but a child he was very fond of; their relationship had hardly changed at all in twenty-four years.

She got out of bed and staggered to the bathroom, wondering what the hell she and Dennis would say to each other when he got home. She started with a shower, lathering great handfuls of shampoo into that long hair of hers. As well as making her seem younger it cost her a fortune in shampoo, but she knew she wouldn't really have it cut off.

Before she got dressed she looked at her body in the mirror, not for any particular reason - it was just something she did sometimes. Everyone did it sometimes - she was confident of that. Then she pulled on a pair of jeans and a t-shirt. When she was younger, she used to dress up if she was going to make up with a boyfriend. Showing them a bit of thigh or cleavage - or, after a _really_ bad fight, both - often meant that the reconciliation turned out to be simply, "You know what? Forget it."

Rose had once said, catching her sister on her way to see a man, "That's so _obvious_." She was a worldly wise teenager then - Conchita was sure she didn't approve. Her reply had been, "Rose, men _like_ obvious. They have no imaginations." (Conchita sometimes thought that being a lesbian must have a great many upsides, but even if she wanted to be one she just couldn't.) But she had to give Dennis more credit than that, especially now, after two and a half years. And besides, it was November. She pulled on a sweater too, tied back her hair in a messy ponytail and went to the kitchen to start breakfast.

She was cutting slices of toast in half when she noticed the calendar on the wall, just above her eye line, and realised that she was a week late menstruating. She just stared at the little blue cross for ages, chewing her bottom lip and wondering how to feel. Three things occurred to her all at once: she wanted a baby more than anything; she and Dennis had never, ever discussed children and he might not be ready for years; and stress had made her late plenty of times in the past, so it might be nothing. Then the door to the apartment clicked open, and Conchita jumped away from the calendar.

"Hi," said Dennis, smiling when he saw her.

She smiled back. "Hey. You want some toast? I made loads."

"Sure, as you made loads," said Dennis. "Thanks."

He sat down at the table, and she took it to him. It was always that way when he'd been working a night shift - and then he'd make her dinner in the evening, after he'd had his eight hours' sleep. Conchita had nothing against cops, as her father did, but she _did_ wonder why the hell anybody would want to do it. This constant shift-swapping was on top of the danger of being inured or killed, _and_ having to hear about all the most horrible and upsetting things that happened in the city. She would never cope with that - it was hard enough hearing about murders and such on the news - and she really admired Dennis for it. He had been newly qualified when they met again after fifteen years (having had just one forced play date as kids, during which she played with his sister Karen and left him with her own younger and moodier sister), and his uncoloured optimism about the difference he could make to New York was the first thing that she fell in love with.

"Listen," she said, sitting down next to him. "My relationship with Oscar really _is_ completely innocent, but I can see why it bothers you so I'll ask him to tone it down."

"You don't have to do that," said Dennis, obviously wanting her to.

"I know," said Conchita.

She wanted to make love after that, and Dennis was happy to comply, but first he had to go through his bedtime routine so that he could go straight to sleep afterwards. While he did that Conchita stripped off (that whole getting up ritual had been a complete waste of time and effort), got into bed and draped the sheets alluringly over her body. Then, while she waited, she worried about whether she was pregnant or not. Should she tell Dennis yet, or were you supposed to wait to tell them until you knew for sure?

The really puzzling thing was that she didn't know what to hope for. If she wasn't pregnant, there was a good chance that her orgasm would bring on her period (assuming she got there, but if she failed it would be the first time with him) - but then what? No baby. She thought of when she had held Robbie, and he could barely fit her whole finger in his little fist; and she thought of Tom, two years old, adorable and with absolute supremacy over Oscar; and Emma, her cousin's little girl. God, but she loved that kid. Conchita had been sixteen when Kevin and Rachel announced the pregnancy, and seventeen when the baby was born. Rachel had looked like death warmed up, and now seemed not to want to repeat the experience, but Conchita wasn't put off at all. That was when it started. She was still practically a child herself, and she _wanted_ one of those things like Oscar wanted that record contract, and Jessica wanted that million dollars.

Then a third possibility occurred to her, and that one was genuinely scary: a phantom pregnancy. She wasn't pregnant, but she was so tanked up with hormones from wanting it so badly that she would fool even the most sophisticated pregnancy test. She panicked at the thought, and then tried to calm herself. It couldn't be true, because that only happened if you were desperate. Even when she was holding Robbie she hadn't _ached_ for a child of her own, as one reputedly does before a phantom pregnancy. Whether she was pregnant or she wasn't, it would be fine. She would either have a baby soon, and cope, or she'd have one in a few years when she and Dennis both felt more ready for it.

She had just about reached this stage when Dennis walked in, and she smiled at him, still wondering whether she was supposed to mention the possibility of pregnancy yet. She wished now that she had just once thought to ask her mother what _she_ did; Conchita knew that she herself had come as a surprise. She didn't want to bring it up now, though. If Dennis had sensed that something was on her mind and said something like, "Are you okay?", she would have had to tell him. But he didn't. He went straight over and started kissing her. Thank goodness she knew how to look alluring.

It was distracting. It was good in other ways, of course, but it _was_ distracting. When she came she had forgotten all about bringing on her period, which was probably a good thing. Then they lay draped all over each other for a bit, and he started to fall asleep.

"Dennis," Conchita said at length.

He shifted slightly, and then answered her with, "Mmmm?"

"Will you marry me?"

.-.-.-.

She didn't do it because she wanted to prove that she loved him as much as she said she did - she gave them both more credit than that - and she definitely didn't do it because she might have been pregnant. A child didn't make you ready for marriage; that was what she had been taught. Hell, she even remembered sitting with Rose while they witnessed their own parents' wedding. (There was a rumour that Dennis had been a guest at _his_ parents' wedding, but no one knew for sure. They were all far too polite to ask Sooji and Michael Wu to their faces, but not too polite to speculate about it behind their backs.)

Conchita showered and dressed again, ate an apple and then went out, leaving Dennis to sleep. As it was a Saturday there was a chance Rose might be at her parents' apartment, and she was. She was in an armchair with Iago on her lap, and she and her mother and father were just talking. She was probably filling them in on her life. She would have spent the night with her loving and faithful partner of three years, never having even to _think_ about contraception. Oh yes, there were _definitely_ upsides to being a lesbian.

"Are you okay, honey?" asked Kylie, looking faintly concerned when her older daughter walked in.

"Don't I look okay?" Conchita asked anxiously. Shit, maybe she looked _pregnant_! And Dennis didn't even know yet. _She_ didn't even know yet!

"Of course you do," said Kylie. "I just thought you'd want to stay with Dennis."

"Well he's not much fun when he's asleep. He's working nights," she added, when she caught Rose glancing at the wall clock. Then she blurted out, "We're getting married."

They all stared at her for a moment, and she began to feel uncomfortable. Then she looked at Kylie - she didn't dare to look at Eduardo yet - and said, "I suppose you think I'm too young."

"Honey, you're only too young until you feel ready," said Kylie.

"Well I _do_ feel ready."

"Of course you do." Finally, Kylie stood up and hugged her. "You wouldn't have agreed to marry him if you didn't feel ready. Congratulations, honey."

"I didn't agree," said Conchita. "I asked."

"Excellent," Rose approved. "If a woman wants to get married she _should_ ask - rather than forcing her friends to listen to her moaning about how he hasn't proposed yet."

Well, even if Rose _hadn't _been okay with it, she clearly was now. So Conchita looked at her father and said tentatively, "Dad?"

He said, looking a little bit sad as he met her eye, "It'll be hard letting you go."

"Well you won't have to do _that_."

"No?"

"Dad," said Conchita. She went and sat with him, and said soberly, "I am completely confident that Dennis will never, ever turn violent towards me or our children." _Eek_!

"Good," said Eduardo. "But promise me that if he ever does, you'll come straight to me."

"Dad, c'mon, Chita would never stay in an abusive relationship - she has too much self-respect," said Rose. Then she looked at Conchita and said firmly, "You wouldn't, would you? The first time he hits you, you're outta there - right?"

"He's not _going_ to hit me," said Conchita.

"And don't let him tell you what to do either," said Eduardo.

"_What_?"

"Marrying you doesn't put him in charge. Make sure he knows that."

"Dad," said Conchita. "Dennis became a cop because he wanted to fight crime and make this city a better place."

Eduardo looked amazed for a moment, perhaps wondering how he had raised such a gullible daughter. Then he said, "It's not just about being a cop - your mom did it to me."

"That's right, I did," Kylie admitted. "But only because I was worried by what I'd seen of Carl and Beth's marriage."

"And Carlos _was_ a cop back then," Rose added helpfully.

"I wish I hadn't prejudiced you by telling you he was a cop straightaway," said Conchita, looking at Eduardo. "I mean, imagine if you replaced 'cop' with 'Asian'," which Dennis was, with one white American quarter on his mother's side.

"Conchita!" Eduardo looked horrified. "There's nothing _wrong_ with being Asian!"

"And he didn't _choose_ to be Asian," added Rose, her hand moving rhythmically over the softly purring cat on her lap. "It doesn't say anything about the kind of guy he is."

"Rose, you're not helping," said Conchita, beginning to feel a little bit riled.

"Chita," said Eduardo. "Do you remember what I said to your sister when she, she came out?" (It fascinated Conchita how parents always did that. She rarely heard a parent talk to one child about another using its name; it was always "your sister" or "your brother".)

"You just wanted her to be happy?" said Conchita.

"Well the same goes for you. If you _really _want to marry a cop…" He evidently couldn't bring himself to say the words, but the sentiment remained.

"It's a bit like Jessica's Tom someday getting involved with a wedding planner, isn't it?" said Rose, and they all laughed at the mere thought, except for Rose herself. She sometimes made jokes, quite deliberately, but she never laughed at them.

"Oh God, don't even joke," said Kylie. "Oh, honey - did you get to meet the new one?"

"Robbie," said Conchita. "Yeah, I did. He's _so cute_…" and she was off, perhaps making her mother regret asking. Kylie had been interested in Emma, but the only baby Conchita had seen her _really_ into was Rose. It might freak her and Eduardo out if they became grandparents in their forties, but they'd love it really. Conchita vowed not to stay chatting to her family for _too_ long. A trip to the chemist that day was definitely in order.


	4. Chapter 4

**Adam**

"It doesn't look like there's anyone here."

Adam Jackson, collapsing into the familiar and comforting embrace of the sofa in his own living room, said, "Good."

Max Miller wandered in from the next room, and gave him the oddest look: sympathy mixed with disapproval and confusion, with a little sadness thrown in for good measure. "You mean you're still not going to tell them?"

"There's no point in telling them until I know what I'm dealing with."

"Well," Max said dubiously, "if you say so. Let me get you something to eat. What would you like?"

"I'll get it." Adam stood up and made his way through to the kitchen. "If I start expecting people to do everything for me I don't stand much chance, do I?"

"Don't talk like that," said Max.

Adam didn't respond. He started making himself a sandwich, realising how physically normal he felt and wondering whether that was a good sign. He did feel a little lighter, but he didn't feel unwell, as he had expected to. He'd had a night of drugged sleep at the hospital, and then felt perfectly fit to go home.

"I've been reading about it," said Max.

Adam felt himself shudder. "_I_ haven't."

"Well maybe you should - it's reassuring stuff. The survival rate is more than ninety percent these days. And," Max went on, giving Adam a don't-interrupt look, "if anyone _doesn't_ make it it's because they just didn't catch it in time. _You _did!"

There were several reasons why Adam had chosen Max as his confidant, and one was his aptitude for tact and decorum. They both knew that Adam had left his right testicle in the capable hands of one Dr. Gibson, but Adam - just sixteen, and sensitive about his body - didn't feel comfortable talking about it in such explicit terms, as Max evidently realised.

"There might be more," said Adam.

"Well there's an outside chance," said Max, "_if _it was malignant in the first place - but I can't stop you worrying, I know that. Don't you want…?"

Adam took a bite out of his sandwich, chewed and swallowed whilst waiting for Max to continue. Then he said, "What?"

"Support."

"I told _you_, didn't I?"

"Yeah," said Max, "but I'm going home soon, and then you'll be with your family, and they won't know. Unless you tell them."

"I'm not telling them," said Adam. "I don't want to worry them unnecessarily."

Max sighed. "All right, I can't make you. What about Amanda?"

"No, no, no," said Adam, shaking his head. "She _could_ make me. And she would too."

Adam had been going out with Amanda Mills since they were twelve years old, and was as much in love as any sixteen year old could be. He had thought about confiding in her, and almost did, but then had decided to wait until he knew more. He had also thought about telling his half-sister Natalie, who was in her late twenties, and would have cleared up the doctors' concerns about appropriate adults right away (Max was twenty-three, and adult enough, but Dr. Gibson had begrudged him the fact that he obviously wasn't related to the patient). But Natalie would have told their mother, and Adam didn't want that. Really, Max was the only choice. He was one of the kindest and most selfless people in the world, and he also happened to be a man, which in this instance was certainly a plus.

"All right," Max said now. "So it's just me, then. You'll call me if you need anything else, won't you?"

"Sure," said Adam. "Look, Max, I'm really grateful for - "

He stopped abruptly as the front door opened, and he recognised the heavy footfall straightaway as his father's. Roland Jackson came into the room, smiled at both Adam and Max, and said to his son, "Hey, you're back. Did you have a good time?"

"Yeah," said Adam, avoiding Max's eye.

"Good."

There was a long, awkward silence.

"Are you okay?" asked Roland.

"I'm fine," said Adam, with a smile that felt weak on his face.

Max jumped in and saved him, saying simply, "Well, anyway, I've gotta go. I'll see ya."

"I'll see you out," said Adam, who wanted to finish giving Max his heartfelt thanks.

When they were on the front porch, Max said in a low voice, "I feel terrible."

"So do I," Adam said pointedly.

"Where does he think you were?"

"Just with friends. Look, Max, I get that you feel guilty, and I _am_ sorry to have to do it to you, but could you please just keep it to yourself? The reason I'm not telling my family is because I don't want to have to deal with other people's feelings about this yet."

"I'll never mention it again," said Max. "Just keep me informed, okay?"

"I will. And really, thank you - I don't know what I would have done without you."

.-.-.-.

For another ten or twelve hours, Adam was sick with worry, but then he found that he had a lot to distract him. First, he realised that his sister Lucy's fourteenth birthday was less than a week away. He was not in the habit of forgetting, but this time he forgave himself, as he thought it was understandable. And so he was confronted with the gargantuan task of finding her a present. He had no idea what she or any other fourteen-year-old girls liked. Then, while he was puzzling over the question, his mother called him to the phone.

Adam both hoped and feared that he was about to hear the results of his test, and got a jolt when he found himself talking to Sasha Daniels. She was Natalie's half-sister on her father's side, and Adam's sort-of friend. She was twenty days older than he was, and their mothers had made them spend time with each other from antenatal classes right through to their early adolescence. Then they had been allowed to organise their social lives entirely independently, and didn't always choose to spend time with each other. Still, they got on well enough, and occasionally they got together socially.

"Do you have anything for Lucy yet?" asked Sasha.

"No," said Adam.

"Cool. Mom wants me to get her something from all of us - she seems to think I'll know what she likes. Isn't that nuts? So, do you think maybe you could help me out?"

Adam agreed at once. He was not confident that he could take complete charge of the expedition, but with him being Lucy's brother and Sasha being a teenage girl, he thought that they could probably put their heads together and help each other a great deal. So the next morning, he found himself trawling through the shops with Sasha.

She wasn't bad company at all. She and Adam almost certainly wouldn't have chosen each other as friends; she was a fun-loving athlete who tended to hang around with the school jocks, whereas he was no such thing. But Sasha wasn't _just_ a stereotypical bouncy blonde. She was able to keep Adam's mind off his troubles while they ferreted out items that Lucy might enjoy, and then she took him to the park for soda and hotdogs.

After that, things started to go downhill. They were on a bench, finishing up their hotdogs, when Sasha suddenly produced a handful of chocolate bars from one of her shopping bags and said, "Want one?"

"When did you buy those?" asked Adam.

Sasha giggled, and said, "I didn't."

Adam's heart sank. "You've _got_ to be kidding me."

"Go on, have one - it's just a bit of chocolate."

He looked away defiantly. "No."

"All right, suit yourself."

They sat in silence for a little while, until Adam's thoughts slipped back to his health. So then, by way of a distraction, he looked at Sasha and said, "What else did you steal?"

"Nothing," she said innocently. Then, "Just a pair of pants."

"_What_? When did you…? Oh, wait, I know. It was when you got me looking at all those jackets and stuff."

Sasha laughed again. "Yeah, like you're capable of picking out clothes for your sister. You should have guessed I was up to something."

"Sasha," said Adam. "Do you think this is funny?"

"Oh, come on, lighten up - no one'll miss them."

"Do you do it often?"

Suddenly Sasha's face fell into a scowl. "Can we talk about something else now please?"

"Why did you tell me?" asked Adam. "Surely you knew I'd react like this."

"Adam, jeez, I _thought_ you were cool. I was even going to get _you_ to try it."

"Try what? Shoplifting? No you weren't."

"Yes I was. Just something small - it gives you a real buzz."

"You need help."

"What's the matter?" said Sasha. "Not scared, are you?"

"If you like," said Adam, and he got to his feet. "I don't have time for this, Sasha. Look, thanks for your help today. I'll see you."

"You're pathetic," said Sasha, her voice suddenly thick with disdain. "Do you _really_ wanna waste the best years of your life on being a goody-goody? Learn to live a little!"

Adam, still facing away from her, grimaced. "Don't say that."

"Do you wanna come out with me and the guys tonight?"

"What guys?"

"Just some guys from the football team. They all think you're a total geek, but I told them you're cool underneath it all. Do you _want_ to make me look stupid?"

"Sasha, for God's sake." He turned back to look at her. "Do you think I care what you told a few meathead football players about me? Why are you doing this?"

"Doing what?"

"Turning into a criminal, and trying to drag me down with you!"

"Hey," said Sasha. "We could be having a Bible meeting tonight, for all you know."

"Ah-ha," said Adam. "And are you?"

"If you want to know, why don't you come along? Meet me outside my house at eight."

For a moment Adam hung there, wondering what to do. He couldn't believe that Sasha really _wanted_ to turn into a hoodlum, and he wondered whether this whole thing was a plea for him to save her from herself and these guys from the school football team. He had always known she was immature and easily led, but he wouldn't have expected her to get caught up in something like this. But that was her call. If she wanted _him_ to get caught up in it too, she'd be disappointed. He had no intention of going to her house at eight that night. If he was going to snap her out of this, it had to be there and then.

Then, in that split second, Adam made his decision. He and Sasha may have shared a half-sister, but they weren't in any way related, and she was not his responsibility. He had more important things to worry about now. He had made plans with Amanda that night, and he intended to honour them. He had to put himself first. He might be facing _cancer_, for crying out loud! So, with this sobering thought in his mind, he walked away.

.-.-.-.

At six thirty that evening, Adam and Amanda went to see a movie, on which Adam could not concentrate. He imagined that he did indeed have cancer, and it was spreading through him at that very moment, and it would kill him within the next few years. Then he imagined that he had cancer, and it had spread to his remaining testicle, and he would survive but be unable to have children. Adam did want to have children someday, and he didn't imagine that he would want to have them with anybody other than Amanda.

When they went to dinner afterwards and got talking, she was able to distract him from his worrying. They exchanged news on what they had done during the day. She told him about her visiting aunt and uncle, and he told her about his shopping trip with Sasha.

"Are you okay?" Amanda asked, when he stopped just short of the part about shoplifting.

"She invited me to go out with her and a bunch of football players tonight," Adam said.

"Really?" She sounded surprised. "Why?"

"I don't know. She said she thought I was cool."

"You _are_ cool," said Amanda, smiling. Then she looked at him, and the smile vanished. "Adam, something's wrong. Tell me what it is."

"I'm worried about her," he said. "I think she's getting herself into trouble."

"What kind of trouble?"

"I'm not sure exactly. But she _has_ been, um… well, shoplifting."

"Oh," said Amanda. "What are you going to do?"

"Do?" said Adam. "What _can_ I do?"

"I don't know. I just thought you'd want to help. She's your friend, isn't she?"

"Kind of." He let out a sigh. "I _do_ want to help. I just don't know how."

"You've tried talking to her about it?"

"Of course."

"Maybe you should pass it onto Natalie."

"Rat her out, you mean?"

"Well," said Amanda, "if she's breaking the law…"

Of course she hadn't meant to, but Amanda had made Adam feel guilty about not doing more to help. When she went to the bathroom between courses, he took out his cell phone and called Sasha. It was well after eight - she could be doing anything by now.

"Hey," he said, relieved when she answered. "Where are you?"

"Um… I'm not sure," she said. "We're just… driving around."

As she said this, Adam heard an alarming screeching noise in the background.

"_Who's_ driving?" he demanded.

"Martin."

"Martin… Wait, not Martin _Jones_! The guy who's famous for breaking people's noses on the football field, and - oh my God, you're joyriding, aren't you?"

Several people looked up, and Adam shrank down into his seat.

"Fuck you, Jackson," said Sasha. Then she hung up.

Amanda returned moments later, and they ordered dessert. Adam was even more worried now about Sasha, but he didn't mention anything about it to Amanda. He reminded himself that he was supposed to be seizing the day, and enjoying every moment that he had with her, just in case… well, just in case.

.-.-.-.

The next morning, Adam went to see Sasha. The door was opened by her father, Spence, who invited him in and sent him up to Sasha's bedroom. He found her lying facedown on her bed, her beautiful blond tresses a total mess, and her hands over her ears. Clearly she was objecting to the music blaring through the wall from her brother's bedroom. Adam shook her, and she looked up in surprise.

"Don't tell me you have a hangover," he said.

She shook her head. "I'm just tired." Then suddenly she seemed to wake up. She jerked herself into a kneeling position, and became defensive. "What's it to you anyway?"

"I'm worried about you."

"Ha!" She threw back her head dramatically. "Don't worry about me."

"Sasha, come on, this isn't you."

"Oh, yeah, like you know me so well."

"Obviously I don't," said Adam. "Look, what can I do to make you stop this?"

"Nothing, Adam," said Sasha. "Nothing at all."

"Well… what are you doing tonight?"

"None of your business."

"Whatever it is," said Adam, making a split-second decision as he realised that anything had to be better than worrying about cancer, "I'm in."

"Really?" She looked momentarily taken aback. Then she adopted an evil grin, and said, "What if you missed your chance?"

"Well, have I?"

Sasha seemed to consider this. Then she said, "No. Be at school at nine tonight - the bike racks behind the art room."

Adam raised his eyebrows. "School?"

"That's what I said, retard."

.-.-.-.

So at nine o'clock, Adam found himself waiting by the bicycle racks behind the art room at school. Ten minutes later, Sasha turned up with three very large boys, all of them wearing gloves and balaclavas and carrying some kind of equipment.

"Early, were you?" she said. "Moron. Here." From somewhere about her person she produced a spray can and a crowbar, and held them out to him.

"I don't think so," said Adam.

At this, the three large football players all started laughing raucously. Sasha pulled up her balaclava, and glared at Adam.

"Adam, Jesus, I told them you were cool! Stop making me look like a moron!"

"Sasha,what the hell is wrong with you?"

"What are you even _doing_ here?" asked one of the boys. "Sasha said you were going to prove to us you were cool."

"Well I'm _not_ cool," Adam retorted. "Sasha, come on, let's just walk away from this."

"No way, man," said one of the boys, walking over to them. He grabbed Sasha's elbow with one hand, and with the other he pulled up his balaclava. Before Adam had time to see his face, Sasha had become attached to it.

Meanwhile, on either side of him, one of the boys was smashing windows while the other spray-painted graffiti onto one of the walls. Adam couldn't see exactly what he was writing and/or drawing in that light, and he didn't much care. It was all very petty and unoriginal - just destruction for the sake of it.

Sasha and her boyfriend - whom Adam was sure was the notorious Martin Jones - had now sunk to the ground and started groping each other, which frankly was just bizarre. Then suddenly the boy stood up, laughed, picked up a crowbar and headed for one of the windows. Sasha was left on the tarmac to compose herself. As she was sitting up and fiddling with her hair, Adam went over to her for one last attempt.

Then everything became a blur. There were sirens, then a lot of shouting, and the next thing Adam knew he was being frogmarched into the back of a police car.

.-.-.-.

The five kids were all separated, and forced to wait in different rooms. Adam didn't know how this felt for people who were used to getting into trouble, but for him it was agonising. The wait seemed endless. Then finally a cop came into the room, and it was one that he knew: Dennis Wu, ex-lover of Conchita Rivera, a friend of the Jackson family. They had split up once when she was pregnant, and then again when their daughter was six weeks old. Even a year on from that, Adam felt a sense of unease at seeing Dennis, and hoped that he would be able to maintain his professionalism.

"Isn't this a conflict of interest?" Adam asked.

"I heard you were here," said Dennis. "I just came to… Well, I'm told that you stuck out immediately as not being dressed like the others, and not being in possession of any suspicious items. Miss Daniels has said you were trying to persuade her to walk away."

Adam felt a faint flicker of hope, for himself _and_ for Sasha. "Really?"

"Is that true?"

"Yes. But Sasha… I mean, she's not…"

"I don't know her," said Dennis, "but do I know that this isn't you. Those other three seem to want to implicate both of you, but - just between you and me - they're notorious troublemakers. I wouldn't worry too much about it. Listen, we called your parents, and your mom's on her way. I'll talk to her before she starts getting mad at you. Now I'd better go - I'm not really supposed to talk to you without an appropriate adult present."

Appropriate adults again. Everyone knew that being a teenager - not quite an adult and not quite a child - in many ways sucked. Over the past few days, Adam had been feeling this more than ever.

Dennis left, and then under an hour later another police officer walked in with Grace, Adam's mother. Adam jumped to his feet and hugged her.

"I'm sorry, Mom," he said.

"Adam, honestly, what were you _thinking_?" said Grace, hugging him back.

"I… well…"

"I _know_ what you were thinking," she said, breaking the hug. "I talked to Dennis."

"Do you people _know_ Officer Wu?" the cop asked suspiciously.

"Of course not," Grace said dismissively, over her shoulder. Then she looked back at Adam. "They're letting you go without charge. You were lucky, Adam."

"You sure were," the cop said grudgingly.

"Promise me you won't do anything like that again, okay? If you suspect that one of your friends is in trouble, then just… just _don't do that_!"

"Don't worry, I won't."

They drove home in Roland's car. On the way, she filled him in on her side of things.

"I didn't _exactly_ tell your father you'd been arrested," Grace said. "I'll fill him in on what happened - I'm sure he'll understand."

"Probably," said Adam. "You're the strict one anyway."

Grace blinked in surprise. "Am I? Well, anyway, I saw Spence and he is absolutely _spitting_. Hopefully now he and Stephanie can deal with Sasha. Adam, honey, if you knew something was going on with her…"

"I didn't know _what_ to do," said Adam. "I just thought I could talk her round without it turning into a big deal. I mean, she's not really _like_ that… is she?"

.-.-.-.

In the morning, an official looking letter came for Adam. He took it up to his room, shut the door and read it. Then he got out his cell phone and called Max.

"It was malignant," he said, in quiet and furtive tones.

"Oh Adam, I'm sorry," said Max. "It'll probably be okay, though. You're at very little risk after the surgery. Have you made an appointment for more tests?"

"No, not yet. I'll do that next."

"Okay, good. And you've told your family?"

"Well…"

"Adam, come on!" said Max, sounding almost angry. "You had a lump that turned out to be cancerous! You have _got_ to tell them!"

"Max, come on, they'll freak out. It's better if I wait until I know - "

"No it isn't," said Max. "It's all very well me reassuring you, but you must be terrified. You _need_ them! Adam, if _you_ don't tell them - "

"Okay," he said. "All right, fine, I'll tell them."

"Good." There was a pause, then Max said in less animated tones, "So… interesting night last night, huh?"

Adam's heart sank. "You heard about that?"

"Natalie called me earlier, and Dennis kind of mentioned it to Chita. I don't think she was really supposed to pass it on, but anyway, pretty much everyone knows by now."

"Oh God," said Adam.

"We all know why you were there, Adam. But listen, I don't want you to worry about her anymore. Her family all know now, so they'll deal with it. And I'll help. She seems to like me - maybe I can talk to her. You just worry about yourself, okay?"

Adam called to make an appointment at the hospital, and to his relief he found that they could fit him in that very afternoon. Then he went downstairs, fully intending to tell his mother and sister about the cancer, as he had assured Max he would. Roland was at work, and Adam wasn't sorry. He couldn't handle telling all three of them at once.

Then as soon as he saw Grace working in the box room she optimistically called an office, and Lucy chatting to some friend or other on the phone ("My brother got arrested last night!"), he realised that he still couldn't tell them. It would cause them so much distress, which he didn't want to have to handle just yet, and anyway he'd be off to his appointment in a few hours. After that, surely it couldn't be long before he knew whether or not he had a fight on his hands. Until that time came, he was not going to worry them.

"Can you _not_ spread it around?" he said, when Lucy got off the phone.

"It was only Ruby," she said.

"Only Ruby!" said Adam. "Fabulous. My secrets are safe."

"Oh, stop bitching," said Lucy. "Everyone will have forgotten in a week or two."

.-.-.-.

Waiting at the bus stop, a couple of hours after lunch, Adam reflected on what an abysmal week he was having. It would just be typical if he _did_ hear that his cancer had spread, and he was going to have to be castrated completely. If this did indeed turn out to be the case, of course it would be worth it to save his life, but it was a hideous thought all the same. He was sixteen years old. How was any of this fair?

With the way he was feeling, perhaps it wasn't a bad thing when Sasha turned up to distract him, but Adam was not at all happy to see her. He tried ignoring her, but she walked right up to him and said loudly, "_There_ you are. So how did your parents take it? My dad almost _killed_ me."

"So I should think," Adam said shortly, facing away from her.

"Look," Sasha went on, "I didn't know we were gonna get sprung. That was just really shitty luck. But you got out of it okay, didn't you? I knew you would."

Adam looked at her. "Was that your idea of an apology?"

"Apology? Fuck that - _you_ decided to come along."

"I was only trying to help _you_."

"Oh, really? Well I don't _need_ your help. What I do has got nothing to do with you, and you can't accuse me of dragging you into it - you _wanted_ to be there."

" 'Wanted' is a strong word," said Adam. "But okay, it _was_ my decision to go along and try to change your mind about what you were doing. Thank goodness it wasn't anything more serious. I know you told the cops I was only there to try and get you to walk way."

"Well," said Sasha, "that was the truth, wasn't it? They asked me, so I told them."

Adam didn't answer. He had just spotted his bus.

"Where are you going, anyway?" asked Sasha.

"Nowhere," said Adam, as the bus pulled up at the roadside.

"Oh, okay, fine," Sasha said irritably. "So you're still mad at me."

Adam said nothing. He boarded the bus, purchased his ticket and then went to take a seat near the back. As he turned and walked away from the driver, to his intense annoyance he heard Sasha's voice behind him. "I'll have the same ticket, please." Then, as soon as he had taken his seat, she sat down beside him.

"What are you doing?" he said.

"I'm not letting you storm out on me."

Adam let out a sigh. "That's not what I was doing." His animosity towards Sasha had vanished now, and he didn't want to argue anymore. All he cared about was his health.

"So you can tell me where you're going, then."

"It's none of your business."

"I thought we were friends. Come on, Adam, don't be mad at me. It's all over now - let's just forget it ever happened."

"Sasha," said Adam. "I'm sure you would love for this to be about you, but it isn't."

Her face fell into a scowl. "What's that supposed to mean?"

"Oh… nothing, nothing."

Adam could do nothing to stop Sasha from chattering all the way to his stop. Then at last he was able to get off the bus, and she followed him. Adam began to despair. There was no question of him missing his appointment, so that meant she was about to find out.

Once they were nearing the threshold, Sasha saw the sign. _The Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center_. Adam heard her gasp, and then sensed that she had stopped following him. Without a moment's pause, he made his way into the building.

"Adam, wait!" She ran after him, and caught up with him at the reception desk. "Do you have _cancer_?"

Adam didn't answer right away. He let the receptionist know who he was, and whom he was there to see. Then he made his way to the appropriate waiting area. When he sat down, Sasha was still with him.

"I did have," he said, not looking at her.

"And now…?"

He didn't answer.

"Oh, well now I feel bad!"

At this, Adam met Sasha's gaze. "_Now_ you feel bad? You're not supposed to feel bad because I've had cancer! You're supposed to feel bad because you did the wrong thing!"

Sasha made no response to this. Instead she said, "Why in God's name are you here on your own? Your mom or your dad should be with you. Or _both_."

Adam did not reply.

"This is insane. I thought they were good people."

"They are!"

"What kind is it?"

Again, Adam let out a sigh. "Well, it's not the worst kind."

.-.-.-.

When Adam's next ordeal was over, and he was free to go home to wait for his test results, he found Sasha waiting for him. She was reading a leaflet with an expression of horror. When she saw Adam she threw the leaflet down, leapt to her feet and declared, "This stuff is _terrifying_! I almost wish I hadn't read it, but I suppose it's better that I did. Do you know the signs of ovarian cancer?" Adam was making for the exit by this time, and Sasha was following him. "Difficult periods and excess body hair! I mean, eww! Can you imagine going to the doctor and saying, 'I have difficult periods and excess body hair. Can you please test me for ovarian cancer?' How _embarrassing_! But I guess it's a good thing there actually _are_ signs. I mean, how can you check your ovaries for cysts?"

"You can't," said Adam. "Sasha, what are you still doing here?"

"Oh, listen to it!" said Sasha. "What am I still doing here! You _need_ someone here, Adam Jackson. How you expected to do this on your own I cannot imagine! Either of your parents would have come with you, or Natalie, or even Lucy if you'd wanted her to - but you haven't even _told_ any of them, have you? Have you!"

Sasha's basic reaction to things was much the same as Max's had been. The difference was that she was much more outspoken about it. By the time they were halfway home, she had not convinced Adam to tell his family about the cancer, but she _had_ worn him down enough for him to tell her - _very_ quietly - exactly what had happened so far.

"Oh!" she said. "That's really embarrassing for you!"

"Yeah, thanks," said Adam.

"Adam, look. You can't secretly have a ball off - it just isn't _done_."

"How could you possibly know that? Anyway, I already did."

"Well you can't _keep_ it a secret!"

Adam said nothing.

"What about Amanda?" said Sasha. "She doesn't know either, does she?"

"Did you read a leaflet about this one?" asked Adam. "I'm _probably_ going to be fine - there's no need to worry any of them at this stage."

"I didn't really read about it, no," said Sasha. "I didn't think I'd need to know."

"Well, maybe you do. Over fifty percent of the time it's the guy's sexual partner who discovers the lump."

"Yeah, well, I'm not anybody's sexual partner."

"No?" said Adam. "I was a little afraid you and Martin Jones were going to have sex right there outside the art room."

Sasha scoffed. "Oh, please. _You_ know the difference between kissing and sex. Or maybe you don't."

"Look, let's not do this. What you get up to with Martin Jones is none of my business."

"That's right, it isn't. Why the hell did you come with us, anyway? You've got enough on your plate without getting yourself into trouble."

"You _know_ why," said Adam.

"Oh yeah, sure, you were there for _me_."

"And why were _you_ there? I wouldn't have thought it of you, Sasha."

"Oh, Adam, I don't know! Just don't forget it, okay? You've got your own problems."

"All right, fine," said Adam. "It's out of my hands now anyway - I'll stop trying to help."

"Good. And on that note, we're back," said Sasha, getting to her feet as the bus neared Adam's stop. "Now when you get home, Adam, for the love of God _tell them_."

.-.-.-.

Roland was back from work. He was in the kitchen with Grace, both of them scrutinising the contents of one of the cupboards, probably trying to decide what to have for dinner.

"Hi," Adam said awkwardly.

"Oh, hi," said Roland - a little offhand, Adam fancied.

"Dad, listen," he said. "About what happened last night…"

He had no idea what he was going to say next, but fortunately Roland interrupted him, as he had hoped. As Adam had told Grace the night before, she was the strict one. His father could normally be relied upon to understand and forgive.

"Don't worry about it," Roland said. "Actually it's the kind of thing I might have done."

"Really?" said Adam, very much surprised.

"Well, maybe. Many years ago."

"Where's Lucy?"

"The gang called an emergency sleepover," said Grace. "There must be some hot new gossip. Did you want her for something? She'll be gone all night."

"No," said Adam, relieved to hear that Lucy wasn't there. Even separately, neither cancer nor testicles was a subject he'd have felt comfortable discussing with his little sister. "Actually there's something I have to tell the two of you."

Only after she had gone did Adam realise how much Sasha's mere presence had been helping him. The wait for news could surely not be more than a few days, but however soon it came to an end, he knew he couldn't suffer it alone.

"Okay," he said, wondering how this was supposed to be done. "Don't freak out."

"Oh God, what is it?" said Grace, looking as scared as he felt.

"It's not as bad as it sounds," said Adam.

"Worse than being arrested?" Roland asked incredulously.

Adam didn't know what to say. "Well… different. You can't really compare the two."

"Honey, please just tell us," said Grace.

"Okay," said Adam. He dropped his gaze, not wanting to look at their faces while he broke the news, and especially when he got to the embarrassing parts. "The thing is that I found this lump in my testicle, and I had it removed straightaway so it's been gone for, like, three days, and as long as you get it early - which I did - there's no real risk once it's gone, so I'm fine now, I really am, but anyway they had it tested and it turns out I had cancer but it's okay, I don't have it anymore. I just went to the hospital because they wanted to run more tests, just a precaution, but it won't have spread, I'm sure of it, and if it has - I mean, it almost certainly _hasn't_ - but if it has, it's _still_ fine because the survival rate is, like, more than ninety percent so you don't need to worry. I've got some leaflets about it in my room if… if you want to… to…"

He tailed off, realising that he had begun to ramble, and lifted his eyes. He found his parents' faces difficult to read. They contained shock, certainly, but very little else. Adam did not feel comfortable being stared at like that, so he sat down at the table and waited for somebody to speak.

"Why didn't you tell us?" Roland said at last.

"Because," said Adam, "you would have worried. You _are_ worried, aren't you? But there's no need to be, because I'm probably fine now."

"Probably…" said Grace, sounding very distant.

"Well," said Adam, "they never promise you anything. But… you know."

Grace said nothing else. She simply walked over to Adam, wrapped her arms around him and squeezed. Adam felt comforted by this, but also weakened. In his mother's embrace, he felt more scared and vulnerable than he ever had without her.

.-.-.-.

Evidently either Roland or Grace had had a quiet word with Lucy when she got home from her sleepover. For about an hour, Adam kept feeling her eyes on him whenever he made a move. Then finally, when he was reading up in his room, she marched in and said, "Why wouldn't you tell us that?"

"I was waiting for news," said Adam, giving Lucy a slightly different reason from that which he had given his parents, though both were true. "It might have been benign."

"Y'know, I don't _get_ benign tumours," said Lucy. "I mean, what are they _doing_ there?"

"I don't know. Just trying to scare you, I guess."

"But it's gone now, right? You're okay."

"Almost certainly," said Adam.

"And what did you wanna go worrying about Sasha for?" Lucy went on. "I mean, Jesus!"

Natalie wanted to know the same thing when she called round later, having been told Adam's unpleasant news by Grace over the phone.

"If it happens again, you just come straight to me," she said. "Why did you think _you_ could do anything? And if you had cancer - I mean, _God_!"

"I'd gotten rid of the cancer before that," said Adam. "And I didn't even know it _was_ cancer then. Besides, me having cancer doesn't mean nobody else has problems."

"But Adam, someone whose only problem is that she's a dumb little bimbo? Come on!"

.-.-.-.

Lucy's birthday was on Sunday. On the Saturday, a lot of cards and presents arrived for her. She and Adam had a lot of aunts and uncles and cousins, almost all of them on their father's side (Grace could only boast one brother, one niece and one nephew). Adam collected the mail, having resigned himself to not finding out whether he still had cancer until the following week. Then, when he came to the last envelope in the pile, he saw his own name printed on it. It was identical to the last letter he had received, days before.

It was Lucy who found him standing in the hallway, staring down at the sealed envelope. She looked at him. Then she looked at what he was holding. Then she seemed to work it out, and she strode towards him like a goring bull, saying, "Open it! Open it _now_!"

Adam shook his head. Since the tests he had been desperate to know, but now he suddenly found that he didn't want to. Still, it had to be done, so he thrust the letter into Lucy's hands and said, "You do it."

As she ripped open the envelope, Adam turned away from her. If he didn't want to read the words on the page, then he didn't want to read them in her face either.

"You're all clear," said Lucy.

"What?" said Adam, turning to look at her.

"What!" she said. "You heard me. You don't have cancer anymore!"

For a moment, Adam couldn't speak. He saw the relief filling Lucy. She grabbed onto the nearest doorframe, and exhaled as though she had been holding her breath for hours. Then Adam felt it too. The fear he had been feeling seemed to seep out through his toes, and he felt a ton lighter.

"That's what I _told_ you would happen, didn't I?" he said, as Lucy's announcement brought Roland and Grace into the hallway. "Dr. Gilbert, and the leaflets, and Max…"

"Max?" said Roland. "_Max_ knew?"

Grace burst into tears, and threw her arms around Adam, saying, "Oh, who cares? Who cares if Max knew?"

"I'd better call and tell him," said Adam, knowing that it would be a while before he was free to do any such thing.

.-.-.-.


	5. Chapter 5

**Lucy**

Lucy Jackson was working an afternoon shift. She was flicking through one of the old magazines in the waiting area, but she counted that as work as it was all she could think of to entertain the six-month old baby that happened to have been left in her care.

"Those pants look real nice on that model, don't they?" she said. "Maybe I should get myself something like that. When was this out?" She flipped to the front of the magazine, and made a dismissive noise. "Five years ago. Well, so what? He has no more clue about fashion than I do. What do you suppose it is he wants to show me, anyway? I hope it's not his penis again." She paused. "Or do I?"

The baby laughed boisterously, and made a lunge at a magazine about gardening.

"You're right," said Lucy. "It's best not to go there again, however much I might want to. Anyway, dressing up for guys is pathetic. Don't listen to your mother on that one, Lily - you should never dress just to please a guy. Hey, a patient!"

Lucy got to her feet, made sure Lily was comfortable in her arms and then directed a friendly smile towards the door. She dropped the smile, however, when she saw the young man who was looking at her with a mixture of defiance and nervousness.

"Oh, it's you," she said. "What are you doing here? You don't have a pet."

"I do now," said the youth, whose name happened to be Howard Robbins. "I've come to book her in for some shots."

"Which shots?" asked Lucy, making her way over to the reception desk. Fortunately Lily had a portable baby chair there, which Lucy strapped her into.

"Whichever ones she needs," said Howard. "You're supposed to know that, aren't you?"

"Has she had any shots before?"

"No, she's only a puppy."

"Oh, okay," said Lucy, stabbing away at the computer keys to call up the database she needed. "What's her name?"

"Sienna."

She stopped typing to stare at him. "_Sienna_?"

"She's a Dalmatian," said Howard, as though this explained everything.

"Dalmatian, okay," said Lucy, typing that into the database. "Date of birth?"

"June seventeenth."

"This year, presumably."

"I _said_ she's a puppy."

"Just checking," said Lucy. "Why are you looking at Lily like that? You can't _possibly_ be worried that she's ours."

"She doesn't look like ours," said Howard. "She looks Serbian."

Lucy stared at him. "She looks _what_?"

"It's a country in the - "

"I _know_ where Serbia is. She's not Serbian. She's American."

"Of course she is. So when can Sienna get her shots?"

"Friday next week okay?"

"Yes," said Howard, "that's fine."

"Or we could just put her down then," said Lucy, "if you wanted to speed things up a bit."

Howard glared. "You're not being very professional."

"Well that hardly matters now - this is my last shift, so I might as well tell you that I think it's disgusting. Daphne isn't even cold in her grave."

"Yes she is, she died five months ago."

"Five months!" said Lucy, her temper rapidly getting away from her. "She could still be alive today! She _should_ be! She was two and a half years old! And now you've got another dog - what happens if _she_ needs an operation? Are you going to go through life leaving a trail of dead dogs that were just too much bother to look after? People like you shouldn't be allowed to _have_ pets, you heartless, penny-pinching - "

"LUCY!"

The voice of her boss brought Lucy's rant to an abrupt end. He didn't sound angry, but the interruption was certainly forceful. When Lucy turned, she saw Frank Holliday standing in the doorway of the examination room, looking shocked and panicky.

"Why don't I deal with Mr. Robbins?" he said, joining Lucy behind the desk and nudging her gently out of his way.

"And what'll _I_ do?" she asked irritably.

"You go and talk to Ms. Rivera."

Conchita Rivera had already retrieved the baby from the desk, totally unnoticed, and was hanging around the waiting area with Lily's chair in one hand and a cat carrier in the other. With one last poisonous look at Howard, Lucy went to join her.

"Thank you so much for looking after Lily," said Conchita.

"No problem. Can you _believe_ he has a new puppy?"

"Really? Already? That seems kind of quick."

"Daphne should still _be_ here," said Lucy. "That man is the most - "

"Ssh," hissed Conchita. "Dr. Holliday's had to stop you once already."

Lucy gave a contemptuous snort. "What's he gonna do, fire me? This is my last day."

"Oh, so it is!" said Conchita. "Are you excited?"

"I'm terrified."

"Oh, don't worry - you'll be terrific."

Howard was just leaving, and as soon as the door had closed behind him, Frank said, "Lucy, you can't yell at clients like that."

"Nice thing to say to me on my last day," said Lucy. "Wow, Lucy, I'm _so_ proud of you! You're gonna make a _great_ vet!"

"I am," said Frank, "and you are. It's just sometimes people are going to make decisions about their pets that you won't agree with. You'll have to get used to it."

"Oh, don't worry," said Lucy, "I won't yell at anybody else. It's just _him_. The answer's pretty obvious, isn't it? Don't date clients."

"Well, good," said Frank. "Because I _do_ think you'll be a great vet. Listen, there aren't any more appointments until this evening - why don't you take off?"

"What, just like that? You won't see me again."

"You're coming to my leaving do, aren't you? I mean, it's _your_ leaving do too, really."

"I still can't believe you're retiring, Dr. Holliday," said Conchita.

Frank smiled nostalgically at her, and said, "Well, I'm old now."

"Can't you at least wait until Lucy qualifies?"

"No," said Frank, laughing. "That's going to take _years_.Your mother was thirteen when she and Pagan first started coming to me, and now she has three grandchildren. It's time for me to go. They'll take good care of you and Toby here, I promise."

"Of course I'll be at your party, Frank," said Lucy, now over her guilt at having forgotten it. "But I might be a little bit late - I have to go and see someone in the afternoon."

"Well don't be _too_ late," said Frank. "What about you, Ms. Rivera - would you like to come? I'd love someone from your family to be there."

"I'd like to," said Conchita, "but I've got the kids tomorrow night - Dennis is working. Would you like me to send someone else instead? My mom can probably make it."

They established that Frank would love to have Kylie Griffin at his leaving do, and it was arranged that Conchita would pass on the message. She then invited Lucy to go home with her and have some coffee, and Lucy accepted, because she knew how good it was for her sanity if Conchita occasionally spent time with somebody over five.

.-.-.-.

As it happened, Conchita's two older children were out with their respective fathers. She had kept changing her mind for a while, and consequently had had two daughters with her now-husband and a son in between them with somebody else. It was whispered among some that they thought it very strange - even a tad irresponsible - but Lucy thought she understood. It was only too easy to make a wrong decision where men were concerned.

"If you're not going to date clients," said Conchita, once they were settled, and Lily had conveniently gone to sleep, "what _are_ you going to do? How else do vets meet people?"

"Well," said Lucy, "I might just not bother."

Conchita looked disappointed. "Oh!"

"I'm eighteen," said Lucy, suspecting that Conchita had filled her head with ideas of a big, romantic wedding and babies to come. "I don't want to end up like my mom."

"But your mom's lovely."

"I _know_ she's lovely. I do. I love her. Being a mother for all of her adult life was fine for her, but not for me. I _know _it's a big fat cliché, but I do - I want to have a career."

"Well," said Conchita, "so do I."

"What? No you don't."

"Yes I do." She sounded more amused than offended, to Lucy's relief. "I want to teach."

"Do you?"

"Yes! I do have a degree, you know."

"Oh yeah, I forgot."

"That was my plan all along," said Conchita. "Get my art degree, have some babies, then train to teach when they're all at school. I made that plan when I was ten, I think, and so far I haven't strayed from it once."

"If you weren't my friend I'd probably hate you," said Lucy. "I guess it must be nice to be beautiful and smart and good and have your whole life worked out."

"But Lucy, you _are_ beautiful and smart and good and have your whole life worked out."

"Well," said Lucy, "I'm pretty smart, I'll give you that. But I'm not beautiful, and I don't have my whole life worked out. And good? Well… Frank wasn't wrong, you know, it _is_ a worry. I only worked the desk part-time while I was finishing school, and even then there were parts of the job that really got to me. Just for starters, it's _so_ frustrating having to call those poor animals by some of the _stupid_ names people give them."

"Well that's not the _worst_ worry, is it?" said Conchita. "You should try being a mother."

"A mother?" Lucy said absently. "Y'know, someone thought it'd be a good idea to cross-breed his Jack Russell bitch with a Rottweiler. There's one puppy, and it's almost as big as she is. She'll be okay - she's booked in for a caesarean next week - but _honestly_! And then you get your Howards and your Daphnes… Maybe I won't even _like_ being a vet, or maybe it'll all be too much and I won't be able to pass my exams. And as for having kids one day, I really have no idea - oh dear God, I hope I'm not pregnant!"

The moment the words were out of her mouth, Lucy wanted to take them back in. The thought had gripped her suddenly, and induced a panic that gave way to everything else, including her knowledge of where she was and whom she was talking to. Conchita was now, predictably, looking at her with a puzzled expression. It was generally inferred that Lucy had slept with Howard a few times, though never talked about, as she had been legally too young - but that had ended five months ago, with Daphne's untimely demise.

Clearly Conchita was confused, and probably bursting with curiosity, but Lucy knew that she wouldn't push her. She was rare in that she respected people's right to privacy, and had a clear understanding of what was and wasn't her business. Wanting to move the conversation on, Lucy racked her brains for something to say.

But it was Conchita who saved her. She said, "Oh, I've just remembered - I'd better call Mom. What time is this thing tomorrow, Lucy?"

"Seven," said Lucy. "At that restaurant two doors down from the clinic - you know?"

So Conchita called her mother, Kylie, and Lucy sat there feeling rather awkward. Then Lily started crying, so on her way to her daughter's aid Conchita threw the phone at Lucy, hurriedly telling her to make arrangements with Kylie about the leaving do.

.-.-.-.

Lucy spent Saturday morning at home, reading through material for her veterinary course, listening to music and occasionally looking at the calendar to remind herself that she was only a day late. That was nothing - it had happened countless times before.

When she went out after lunch, her mother caught her and asked where she was going. Lucy told her the truth rather than making the whole thing furtive and suspicious with lies. Why turn it into something that it wasn't?

"I'm going to see Jason," she said. "He said he wants to show me something."

"Oh yes?" her mother said. "I've heard _that_ one before. Will you be okay, honey?"

Lucy had always found Grace a particularly attentive mother. At times, when she wasn't in the best of moods, she had even called her interfering. She always seemed to know more than she was meant to. In the three years that she'd known him, Lucy had never done anything to betray her feelings for Jason Beck, but Grace seemed to know anyway. Whether she had guessed the extent of their relationship now, though, was another matter.

"Of course I'll be okay," said Lucy. "Why wouldn't I be?"

"Oh, I don't know. Your bus might crash. Would you like a lift?"

"A lift to New Jersey?"

Lucy's father appeared then, saying, "Oh, are you going to New Jersey? Well, have a good time." Then he kissed her on the forehead, and carried on into the living room. As though to make up for his wife's perceptiveness, Roland Jackson was naïve. Lucy was sure that he thought the most she'd ever done with Howard was to hold his hand.

"I don't want a lift, Mom," she said. "But thanks."

"All right, if you say so," said Grace. "Be careful, okay?"

Lucy inferred a double meaning in that, whether or not one was intended. In fact, she took the comment on a number of different levels. Be careful not to rush into anything. Be careful not to get your heart broken. Or, if you _really_ can't control yourself, be careful not to get pregnant. Lucy believed that Grace was happy, but she also suspected that she would have done things differently if she could go back.

.-.-.-.

He had summoned her to his beachside bar, which was technically owned by his mother, but Jason was going to be running it when it opened in a few weeks' time. Celine Beck would apparently take in the bulk of the profits, but Lucy saw that as a mere formality. As far as she was concerned, Jason had been given a bar for his twenty-first birthday. It was very unfair on everyone who _didn't_ have a bar, or who had had to work to get one, but Lucy was gracious enough not to begrudge him. He was lucky enough to have an enterprising mother, and she had surely taught him well. He'd work to make the place successful.

Upon arrival, Lucy saw that Jason had already been working hard. Any bar was bound to cost a lot of money, but this one hadn't been _too _expensive, as it was in dire need of some DIY both inside and out. Lucy at once saw a marked improvement on the exterior, and once inside, she found a new floor and a half-finished paintjob.

"This place is looking great," she said.

"Thank you, yes, I'm quite pleased with it myself," said Jason, smiling and having the usual effect on Lucy. He made himself attractive on purpose - or rather, attractive to those who liked a certain type - with his few piercings, his tattoo, his dreadlocks and his motorcycle. Lucy often thought that without these things, he would not be a handsome man at all, but the thought did nothing to alleviate her lust.

"So what did you want to show me?" she asked.

"Well," said Jason, "it's kind of hard to explain - you'd better come and take a look. Would you like something to eat or drink first? I, um… don't really _have_ anything, but I can take you to a café or something."

"Maybe later," said Lucy. "I want to see this something of yours first."

"Okay. It's in the basement."

"It's not your penis again, is it?"

Jason blinked in surprise. "What?"

Lucy bit her lip, wishing she hadn't said that. She hadn't even known she was going to.

"When I said I wanted to show you something," said Jason, "I meant the cove."

She smiled, and said, "You meant both, really, didn't you?"

Jason smiled too. Then he said, "Come on," and started making his way down to the basement. It had been a couple of weeks since it happened, and it didn't seem to have changed the dynamics of their friendship at all. Lucy was glad of that - it was just what she'd wanted. A pregnancy would complicate things, of course, but she wasn't going to think seriously about that until she was at least a week late.

"Jason," she said, as they entered the basement. "Have you ever been to Serbia?"

"No, I haven't gotten quite that far yet," said Jason. "Why?"

"Well, Howard - you know, my ex - yesterday he came to make an appointment for his new puppy, and I was looking after Lily - Chita had brought her kitten in for a vaccine - and he said she looked Serbian."

Jason took a moment to order this information. "Howard said Lily looked Serbian?"

"Yes."

"What an odd thing to say. Well, I've seen a few famous people from Serbia, just on TV. Some of them do look slightly oriental."

"What do you mean _slightly_ oriental?" asked Lucy.

"Um… I'd rather not answer that. We're getting dangerously close to racism here."

"Oh, don't worry - Howard was the one who said it. The guy's an asshole. I don't even know why I went out with him in the first place."

"I thought it was because you liked his dog," said Jason.

"Oh yeah," said Lucy, suddenly overwhelmed with a feeling of nostalgia. "Daphne was the best. She was _so funny_! She used to spend _hours_ choosing which ball she wanted before she'd go out for a walk. And she thought she was scared of water, but then one day she fell in this lake, and she loved it so much she wouldn't come out for…"

She tailed off then, as she felt tears pouring down her cheeks. Embarrassed, she tried to wipe them away, but Jason had noticed and already had his arm around her.

"The guy doesn't deserve you," he said, and kissed her on the head, by the parting in her mini-braids. "Don't think about it anymore. Come over here - you'll like this."

He took her hand, and led her to a dark corner that was mostly obscured by old packing crates. Then he sank slowly to his knees, and she followed. He pointed at a jagged hole in the wall, and said quietly, "Look in there."

Lucy looked, and saw what appeared to be a family of little animals. At first, she couldn't make out what they were, but as her eyes adjusted to the darkness she realised that she would _never_ make out what they were. She had never encountered anything like them before, either in real life, or in a book or documentary.

"I don't suppose you know what they are?" said Jason.

"Sorry," said Lucy.

"I was wondering what I should do with them. I mean, they _can't_ stay there. They're cute and all, and I'm sure they're harmless, but they've got to go. I need to fill in that hole, and move those crates, and give the place a paint job - and then when we open I'll have staff in and out of here changing the beer barrels. What do _you_ think I should do?"

"Me?" said Lucy. "Why are you asking _me _about little demon animals? Because my dad's a Ghostbuster, and I might be a vet one day?"

"That's exactly why," said Jason. "Wait a minute - _might_? You _are_ going to be a vet."

"I don't know, maybe not."

"_Why_ not? I thought it was what you wanted."

"Oh, I'm going to try," said Lucy. "But I might suck at it."

"Of course you won't," said Jason. "You like animals, you're good with them, you understand chemistry and biology - that's all you need."

"No it's not," said Lucy. "I'm bad with _people_, that's the problem."

"You are _not_ bad with people!"

"I am. You wouldn't know that, though. Obviously I'm not bad with _you_ - you're not stupid or annoying, and you don't have pets and give them idiotic names or choose to have them put down rather than put time and money into treating their stomach cancer - and I know you wouldn't even if you _did_ have a pet. It's these people who come in with a cat called Mrs. Tiddles or something, or bring in their hamsters when they're about to be stabbed by their own teeth because they're not given anything to chew…"

"Well," said Jason, "yes, I know you don't exactly suffer fools gladly."

"I told Frank I wouldn't yell at anybody other than Howard," said Lucy. "And I wouldn't - I know better than to yell at people - but that doesn't stop them from driving me _nuts_."

"Well I'm glad you're going to try, anyway," said Jason. "I think you'll be a great vet."

"Yeah, well, anyway," said Lucy. "Those things might be harmless, or they might be thinking about jumping out and eating our faces. I think the first thing we should do is move away." They did so, and then Lucy went on, "Then I think you should call the Ghostbusters. If they're really harmless, they won't put them in the containment unit - I'll make sure they take them someplace they can be happy. If they're _not_ harmless…"

"Okay, I get it," said Jason. "Thanks."

"So is that it?" said Lucy. "Is that what I came all the way down here for?"

"Well, it was a good reason to invite you here," said Jason. "I wanted to see you."

"Why?"

"I don't know. Why not?"

Lucy, encouraged by his words and his easy smile at her, felt brave enough to voice the thought that had been haunting her all day. She said, "Jason, what if I was pregnant?"

Jason, to his credit, didn't flinch. He held his expression for a moment while he composed himself, and then said, "Are you?"

"I don't know. Probably not. I _hope_ not."

"So do I," said Jason, "if I'm honest. But if you were, I would ask you what you wanted me to do, and whatever it was I would do my best for you."

"Really?" said Lucy. "What if I wanted to get married?"

"Well in that case," said Jason, "I'd say let's see how we both feel in a few years' time."

"You don't _want_ to get married, then?"

"Not right now. Do you?"

"God no. I don't know why I even said that - I'm sorry. Maybe I have pregnant brain."

He put his head on one side, and gave her an odd look, like a parent despairing of a child. "Lucy, come on, don't think like that. Maybe we should go out and get a pregnancy test."

She shook her head. "No, no - _God_ no, it's too soon for that. Waste of money at this stage - I'm only a day late. I told you, I'm probably not pregnant at all."

"Then we don't need to talk about it yet."

"I just wondered what you'd do," said Lucy. "I _am_ going to worry, you know. I don't see why I should do it on my own."

"I'm not worried," said Jason.

"You're not?" She paused. "Well, no, I guess you wouldn't be, would you? You can still run your bar. I'm the one who has to be pregnant and give birth and take care of it."

"You could still train as a vet," said Jason. "We'd find a way."

"Would we?"

"Sure. You could live here with me, if you wanted to. I could look after the baby during the day, and then you could look after it when you come home and I'm working."

"Oh," said Lucy, intrigued. "So would we be, like… a couple?"

"We could try that," said Jason. "If you wanted to."

"If _I_ wanted to?"

"Yes."

"What about what _you_ want?"

"Me?" said Jason. "Lucy, I don't know _what_ I want."

"So you're prepared to be my cohabiting boyfriend, but only if I'm having your baby?"

"Lucy, stop this. Why discuss it unless we know you _are_ pregnant?"

"You're crazy," said Lucy. "Would you really get into a serious relationship with me just because I was pregnant? You know that's not right."

"Not just because of that," said Jason. "What would you like me to say? I care about you, Lucy. It meant a lot to me - you must know that."

Lucy frowned at him. "Oh, well, that's good to know."

"Don't be like this."

"Like what?"

"We're young, and you're probably not pregnant. You're getting ahead of yourself."

"No I'm not," said Lucy. "If it meant _that _much to you, it shouldn't make any difference to you whether I'm pregnant or not. I don't believe you care half as much I do, because if you did, you wouldn't be talking such shit. I mean, God, _I'm_ in love with you."

She made a split-second decision to tell him, and once she'd said it, she felt relieved. He said nothing, but Lucy wasn't disappointed. It was as much as she'd expected.

"You'd better call the Ghostbusters, then," she said. "I'll go."

"Lucy…"

She didn't shut the door behind her, instead listening for the rest of that sentence, but it never came - and he didn't try to follow her either. She carried on through the building and out onto the street, wondering whether a declaration of love would affect their relationship more than a romp on the beach, and hoping that it wouldn't.

.-.-.-.

To her annoyance, Lucy found herself drawn to the sandy cove where Jason had taken her not so long ago. The sea breeze felt good against the stifling summer heat, just as it had that fateful night. She sat down, gazed out to sea and wondered what to do with herself. On reflection, she thought, she probably shouldn't have told Jason that she loved him.

Then, not very much later, he found her. Her heart leapt. It had to mean _something_, first her going there and then his following her there. But, she knew by now, it wasn't going to turn into anything. He sat down next to her, and she spoke before he had a chance.

"I don't _wanna_ be in love with you," she said.

"Don't you?"

"No. Y'know, it was falling in love with my dad that wrecked everything for my mom."

Jason raised his eyebrows. "_Wrecked_ everything? No it didn't!"

"How would _you_ know? Well… first having Natalie wrecked everything. But she was only nineteen - she had time. She _was_ going to do something. But then she married my dad and had me and Adam, and now that _I'm_ starting college _she's_ in her fifties."

"What was she going to do?"

Lucy shrugged. "_I_ don't know."

"Well," said Jason, "maybe she didn't either. Lucy, people don't always make the decisions that are best for them, but I don't believe Grace would have had you and Adam if it wasn't what she wanted. It's weird the way some people seem to think there's something wrong with being a wife and mother. If it was what she wanted to do - "

"I don't think there's anything _wrong_ with it. Don't put words in my mouth."

"I'm sorry. So it just isn't right for _you_ - is that it?"

"Well," said Lucy, "not now it isn't. _Maybe_ not ever - I don't _know_."

"Well you don't have to decide right now."

"I do if I'm pregnant. Well… if I _am_, I don't really think I have a choice. I wouldn't think about aborting it - I don't think that's right. And I couldn't give it away."

"Lucy, come on, don't think about it yet. You said yourself, you're probably not."

"Yeah, well, what was I basing _that_ on?"

"You're not really late," said Jason. "And we used protection. You wouldn't let me throw it in the sea, remember? We took it back to my place and disposed of it properly."

In spite of how she was feeling, Lucy laughed at the memory. At the time, she had intended it to be one night of passion with the man she loved, ultimately unattainable though he was; a night filled with little moments to make her smile, like the one he had just recalled; a perfect memory that she could look back on without regret. If she _was_ pregnant, she thought, it would serve her right for being so damn reckless.

"All right," she said. "Let's change the subject. Did you call the Ghostbusters?"

"Yes," said Jason. "I asked them to come tomorrow. I wanted to give you a ride home."

"Why?"

"It's the least I can do, after bringing you all the way out here."

"And if your little demons destroy the whole street in the meantime…?"

"Nothing I can do," Jason said blithely, getting to his feet. Then he held out his hand to her, and she let him pull her up. "Come on, let's get you home."

.-.-.-.

He didn't take her home. He took her, at her behest, to Frank Holliday's retirement party. As she hung her helmet on the back of the motorcycle, Jason lifted his visor and said to her, "Have a good time, won't you? And talk to all your vet friends about your plans - I bet they'll all tell you what a great job you're gonna do."

"They _have_ to say that," said Lucy. "I wish I knew what was going to happen next."

"Oh Lucy, come on. Not knowing is what makes life exciting."

As he drove away, Lucy decided that excitement wasn't all it was cracked up to be. The motorcycle was pretty exciting, but it could easily have got them both killed, and now he could just as easily crash it on the way home. Then what? He might die, and she might find she was pregnant. Knowing what life was like, it wouldn't be just one or the other.

She was half an hour late to the party of veterinary surgeons, nurses and receptionists. Kylie Griffin was there, as promised, as well as a few other pet owners who had been with Frank Holliday through all of their two or three cats or dogs. Lucy noticed that the only empty seat was between Kylie and Frank, and decided that they had saved it for her specially, because it was flattering to think so.

"Hi," said Kylie, as a couple of waiters appeared, weighted down with food. "Oh, thank you. Look, my friend's arrived now - what would you like, Lucy?"

"Oh… I'll have whatever she's having," said Lucy.

"Very good, Miss," said the waiter. "Would you like anything to drink?"

She asked for an orange juice, and then the waiter disappeared.

"Are you okay?" asked Kylie.

"Yes," said Lucy. "Why? Don't I look okay?"

"When someone arrives at a restaurant and says, 'I'll have whatever she's having'," said Kylie, "there's usually something on their mind. But don't tell me if you don't want to."

Lucy wasn't going to tell her that she was worried she might be pregnant, especially at such an early stage. She said she was just nervous about starting her veterinary training, and Kylie - like everyone - hastened to assure her that she would do brilliantly.

For the first hour or so, the talk was almost exclusively on the subject of pets. They reminisced about dogs and cats that had long since died of old age, remembered with shouts of anguish owners who had no idea how to care for their pets, and told horror stories about some of the afflictions they'd had to deal with it. Lucy hadn't been around for most of it, and the talk was doing nothing to distract her from her worries. But then she heard her name, and realised that Frank was proposing a toast to her success.

"I want to thank Lucy for everything she's done for us over the past year," he said. "As you probably know, she's starting her training in just a few days' time. I know she'll make a great vet, so let's wish her every success for the future."

Lucy felt rather overwhelmed and a little embarrassed by this. Then she realised she was also feeling a dull pain in her lower abdomen, and this eclipsed everything else. She jumped to her feet, hastily excused herself and made a beeline for the bathroom.

Before returning to the party, she took out her cell phone and sent Jason a text message:

_I'm not pregnant. : )_

Then, vowing never to have sex again - or at least not until she was in her thirties - Lucy made her way back to the world of veterinary practice.

.-.-.-.


End file.
